A few months back, my lovely sister-in-law, Mary, gave me the Sigma Spa Brush Cleaning Mat for my birthday. At the time, I had seen their brush cleaning glove and knew about the basic concept but didn't really think it would make that much of a difference in the cleaning process. Although I had meant to try it a few times since receiving it, I kept putting it off because I was either in a rush or it completely slipped my mind. After going wayyyy too long without washing my brushes thoroughly (and seriously breaking out as a result) I decided to give my brushes a bit of a spa day last weekend and cracked out the Sigma Cleaning Mat for its debut. Here's how it went.

The Sigma Cleaning Mat is a silicone mat that's innovatively designed with different areas of groves and ridges which are meant to clean, refine and rinse your brushes. Half of the mat is designed for cleansing small eye brushes and the other half is made for bigger face brushes. The mat is strategically laid out so that the rinsing sections are under where the sink's faucet head would be and the washing areas at the edges furthest from where the water hits so that you can get a good scrubbing in before rising away the soap. The mat also features suction cups on the back to keep it locked in place while you're scrubbing. Ingenious!





My favorite section on the whole mat would have to be the 'Refine Plus' area. I noticed that the shapes and grooves in those sections really allowed for a deeper clean. It took me a little while to memorize the steps outlined in the directions and figure out what worked best for me. This resulted in the whole cleansing process taking a bit longer than it usually would but now that I have it all down, I do think the process would take as long as usual. The real perk of using this mat to clean you brushes is not in terms of a speedier process, but in terms of a deeper, more thorough clean. I feel like those groves work the soap in between the bristles in a way that I really can't achieve with just my hands.




The only downside is that although Sigma claims that the mat is universally designed to fit most sinks, if your bathroom sink is on the smaller side, like mine, the outer edges of the mat will climb along the sides of your sink instead of laying flat. It wasn't a big deal for me because it still works just as well but if you have a really small sink I would probably recommend getting the glove instead. A benefit to using the mat which I hadn't really considered beforehand is that it keeps your sink clean. Usually after washing my brushes my sink looks beige and gross due to all the makeup residue that comes off my brushes. This means not only do I have to clean my brushes but then I have to scrub my sink too...yay! With the mat, all I had to do was rinse the silicone with some soap and water and set it on my dish rack to dry. No residue on my sink!

I will definitely be using this mat from now on every time I wash my brushes. If you're the kind of person who gets a bit paranoid about what's on your brushes or worry that they're just never completely clean, I would highly recommend checking out Sigma's Brush Cleaning Mat.