Charles Worthington Intense Rescue Melting Balm - Review

I heavily bleach my hair which means I am always on the hunt for a good product that will put moisture back into my hair, and stop it being so dry and brittle.

I read about this product on several blogs, and everyone seemed to be giving it rave reviews, so despite it being a little outside my usual budget, I thought I'd give it a go.

The product is Charles Worthington's Intense Rescue Melting Balm, and it comes in his new range of Salon Secrets products, which appear to be a more luxurious line of 'salon-worthy' treatments.  Of the entire range, this seemed to get the most hype in the blogging world.

I'll be honest, I bought this product over 3 months ago and have been putting off posting a review, purely because I just cannot make my mind up about it.

It is designed to be an intense moisture treatment for dry, thick hair, and it stood out for me in the blogs because people were saying it didn't weigh the hair down, which for me is a massive bugbear with moisturising treatments.  It is one of a new generation of 'pre-wash' treatments, which you apply to your hair before you shampoo it rather than after.

The product itself comes in a wide pot, and when I first opened it I was like "oh my god I just spent £17.99 on this and it is TINY".  I was really concerned that I'd use it all up in one go -and nearly £20 for a on-off at-home treatment is quite a lot.

The product inside is a hard, solid wax which looks really similar to solid coconut oil.  As soon as your finger makes contact with it though, it immediately starts to melt enough for you to easily scoop some out.  When I've used solid coconut oil in the past I have really struggled to scoop it out, but this scoops like a dream.  The consistency is really nice, almost like semi-melted candle wax.

Once you have a 'lump' in your hand, you rub it between your palms and it immediately melts into a light oil.  I was impressed with how much oil was produced by quite a small amount of the solid wax.

You then wipe the oil over your dry hair - I'd recommend just the ends at this stage.  I applied it on my own hair from about 2/3rds of the way down.  The oil coats the hair quite liberally and easily and leaves you with 'wet-look' hair.

The smell of this balm is a-mazing, really gentle but a really pleasant scent.  I can't put my finger on what the scent is, but it is gorgeous, and it stays on your hair after you've rinsed the product out. 

The instructions say you can leave the balm on for anything from 15 minutes to overnight.  The first time I used it, I just left it on for the obligatory 15 minutes, but on subsequent uses I have been leaving it longer (up to an hour).  I've not tried an overnight treatment yet.

One of things I prefer about these "pre-wash" conditioning treatments is that you can pop them on and then carry on with doing other stuff.  I just clip mine up in a bun and leave it to work its magic.  It means you skip the awkward 15 minute loiter in the shower that you get with the post-shampoo conditioning treatments.

With regards to the results, this is where I get a bit stuck.  Up until then, the application/consistency/scent etc are all really impressive.  It feels like a high end product when you are applying it, and the application is practically foolproof.  After I'd rinsed it out, washed my hair and dried it all off, I just wasn't sure what I thought of the results.

You can definitely feel a difference, there is no doubt in that.  To touch, the ends of my hair felt silky.  More silky than if I'd used a decent conditioner? Hmm, not sure.  There is a certain lightness to the silky effect which I will admit is nice.  It doesn't feel in the slight bit greasy, which is surprising bearing in mind the consistency of the actual product.  Visually though, I didn't feel I noticed a massive difference.  My hair didn't look any different, it didn't look silky or nourished any more so than after I've used my regular conditioner.  It did, however, smell divine and as I said before, it felt nice to the touch.

One thing I will say is don't get put off by the size of the pot.  I used this much on my whole hair:

I barely made a dent in it (in my opinion).  It has lasted me about 3 months but I have only used it about 5 times.  Having said that, I still think this is impressive.  Splitting the price across the number of times I have used it gives it an average cost-per-wear of £3.59, which is reaaalllly good.

Having said that, I still don't know whether I love this or not.  I don't think it helps that it has received such rave reviews everywhere else - I was literally expecting a miracle.  This is a really nice product but it isn't a miracle product.  I think its strengths lie in the scent, the application and the fact it gives a really silky but light feel.  I'll be honest, it does make your hair feel like it has had a pamper, but for some reason something is holding me back...it just didn't blow me away, but that might be because it had so much to live up to.  I also haven't tried leaving it on overnight yet, which might give better results.

I'm not sure if I'd re-purchase this.  Although it works out cheap per use, the initial whack of £17.99 is a bit ouchie, although most people seem to have bought this on a 1/3rd off offer so I 'd probably consider buying it again if they ran another one of these offers.  I think it will end up being a product I revisit whenever my hair is feeling particularly ravaged, but I just can't fight the fact that under the gorgeous scent, there was just a tinge of disappointment for me.