Facial Mask Sheets, What Are They Made of?
It is recorded that first type of mask was wash-off type, which is originated from ancient Egypt. The queen of Egypt, Cleopatra VII used gold and egg white mixture for youthful skin. From many historical record, Asian beauty symbol Yang Guifei from Tang dynasty also frequently used pearl powder, ginseng and lotus root powder for wash-off type facial mask.
First type of sheet masks were non-woven fabric made from poly ethylene or rayon. At that time, the facial mask was just a developing category so not so many people paid attention to them. 10 years ago, sheet masks were just a supplementary skincare rather than one of most important routine of the skincare like nowadays. Anyway, the non-woven fabric was rough and was not very adhesive to the skin. So people generally needed to lie down to use these sheet masks. They also dry up very fast, so they are quickly substituted to cotton masks.
From this moment, sheet mask is recognized as main category of Korean cosmetics. In 2009, Genic brought hydrogel masks through home shopping channel and it completely changed the market. Quickly, other companies began to make hydro gel masks. Nowadays companies make facial sheet make with various material such as tencel, bio-cellulose, coconut gel or bean gel.
Cotton: Cotton facial masks are hypoallergenic, non-irritating type of mask that holds good amount of serum. They are generally less expensive than other material so it is adequate for daily mask.
Hydrogel Mask: Hydro gel is a material synthetically made by cross-linking hydrophilic molecules that can holds moisture. Generally hydro gel is highly absorbent so serum in the mask does not run down or get evaporated easily, so it delivers active ingredient effectively to your skin.
Biocellulose Mask: Biocellulose is a fiber synthesized by specific bacteria. The fiber used in this type of mask is very thin, so it has excellent skin affinity. It also can hold water (or serum) up to 100 times of their dry weight, so it is an excellent type of mask material.
Tencel: Tencel is eco-friendly synthetic fiber obtained from eucalyptus pulp. It has extremely soft texture and very hypoallergenic, it is frequently used in baby clothing. It has excellent skin affinity and high air permeability so it offers very comfortable feeling as a facial mask material.
Coconut Gel Mask: It is an edible material also known as nata de coco. Similar to biocellulose mask, it is made by specific bacteria during fermentation process of coconut juice. It has similar but much denser texture than hydrogel and also has very good skin affinity.
