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MUN No. 11 Anarose Rejuvenating Rose Toner Review + 10% Off

I was first intro­duced to MUN in 2013, and I wrote my first review of the now-renowned skin sav­ior known as MUN No.1 Aknari Bright­en­ing Youth Serum (for­merly labelled Night­time Dream Youth Serum) back in May 2013. My love of MUN has held steady these last two years, as its proven itself over and over again as the ulti­mate super­power in face oils.

Even peo­ple who have had the worst expe­ri­ences with face oils will buy MUN Aknari in trep­i­da­tion, then email me two weeks later enthu­si­as­ti­cally exclaim­ing how their skin is now clear/plump/brighter/smooth/you name it.

It’s just one of those prod­ucts that if it ever ceased to exist, there would be a lot – and I mean kilo­liters – of tears.

When Munemi Imai, the beauty and brain behind MUN, told me of her plan last sum­mer to launch a toner, I imme­di­ately knew it would be a stun­ner like its big sis­ter. And let’s put it this way: I was sent a bot­tle for review and have since bought two more. Keep read­ing for all the details!

MUN No. 11 Anarose Reju­ve­nat­ing Rose Toner Review

Years ago, I was not a fan of toners.

I didn’t see the point. They dried out the skin, they were a tremen­dous waste of cot­ton balls, and they seemed like just another way to extract a few dol­lars from our pockets.

I have since changed my mind. A real toner is meant to bal­ance the pH of the skin, and work in tan­dem with your nat­ural skin bar­rier to keep your skin smooth, hydrated, and free of infec­tion and acne. A prop­erly for­mu­lated toner is worth its weight in gold.

The basic idea is that our skin is nat­u­rally acidic, and when we cleanse it alka­lizes our skin, giv­ing way to that “stripped” feel­ing every­one talks about and result­ing in some com­bi­na­tion of the fol­low­ing issues: dry patches, flakes, tight­ness, post-washing oili­ness, and smat­ter­ings of blem­ishes. The two biggest “secrets” to pre­vent­ing this fall­out is to use a more acidic face wash (between pH 4.5 and 6, ide­ally noth­ing above a neu­tral pH 7.0) and use a prop­erly for­mu­lated toner post-cleansing. That’s where MUN saves the day yet again…

Ben­e­fits & Experience

Ton­ers are sup­posed to be on the acidic side (between pH 3 and 5) in order to help bring the skin back to its nat­ural, healthy, acidic state (healthy skin is about pH 4 to 5.5). MUN Anarose is per­fectly acidic at pH 4.5 but don’t be fooled – there’s no burn­ing at all. In fact, it is instantly sooth­ing and encour­ages the skin bar­rier to repair and main­tain itself prop­erly, which pre­vents dry skin, dry patches, rough­ness, red­ness, and blemishes.

I love the sooth­ing and hydrat­ing abil­i­ties of this con­cen­trated toner and I notice a big dif­fer­ence in the hydra­tion level of my skin – dehy­dra­tion lines are nowhere to be found, oil pro­duc­tion slows, and my follow-up skin care prod­ucts like face oil or mois­tur­izer sink in much faster. The tex­ture is watery, not arti­fi­cially thick­ened with fillers. It has the del­i­cately flo­ral scent of rose­wa­ter which dis­si­pates a few min­utes after applying.

How I Use It

First I dou­ble cleanse (first with an oil or cream cleanser, fol­lowed by a gel or foam cleanser) and gen­tly pat dry. I then pour a few drops of MUN Anarose (I’m care­ful to pour slowly, it’s very watery) in the palm of my hand, press my palms together, then press my toner-soaked palms onto my cheeks, fore­head, nose, and chin to dis­trib­ute the toner. I don’t like using cot­ton pads with ton­ers because the cot­ton soaks it up and I would rather my skin do the soak­ing (the only excep­tion I make is a Chizu Saeki lotion mask).

My skin looks and feels instantly radi­ant, healthy, soothed, and hydrated. I imme­di­ately apply my serum and mois­tur­izer. You don’t have to wait for the toner to dry. I like to apply a drop or two of MUN Aknari all over my face while my toner is still a bit damp on my face. Try it that way and you’ll notice even more star­tling results.

Full Ingre­di­ents List

De-ionized Water, Rose Hydrosol* (Rose Water), Aloe Bar­baden­sis (Aloe) Leaf Juice*, Mal­todex­trin, Opun­tia Ficus-Indica (Prickly Pear) Stem Extract, Lycium Bar­barum Fruit (Goji Berry) Extract, Hyaluronic Acid, Salix Alba (Wil­low) Bark Extract*, Rosa Cen­tifo­lia Flower Extract, Jas­minum Offic­i­nale (Jas­mine) Flower Extract, Bel­lis Peren­nis (Daisy) Flower Extract, Xan­than Gum, Veg­etable Glyc­erin, Dehy­droacetic Acid, Ben­zyl Alcohol.

100% Nat­ural. 92.5% organ­i­cally derived. Vegan. *Cer­ti­fied Organic.

Ingre­di­ent Highlights

MUN is known for its qual­ity for­mu­la­tions using the exper­tise of a cer­ti­fied lab in con­junc­tion with its supe­rior sourc­ing of high qual­ity, organic ingre­di­ents directly from Morocco and Bul­garia. Below are some high­lights from the stel­lar ingre­di­ents list.

Rose Hydrosol (Rose Water)

You will notice rose hydrosol as the sec­ond ingre­di­ent, mean­ing it takes up a high per­cent­age of the for­mu­la­tion. In this case, the ingre­di­ent is derived from fresh rose blos­soms hand-harvested from Val­ley of the Roses in Bul­garia, where they are steam dis­tilled to make a con­cen­trated hydrosol. Not all hydrosols are cre­ated equal – in order to cut expenses, many man­u­fac­tur­ers dilute their extracts and dis­til­la­tions with water or syn­thet­ics to lend a stronger rose-like scent that would occur nat­u­rally if the hydrosol hadn’t been of lower qual­ity or diluted heav­ily. Qual­ity rose hydrosol like this con­tains beta carotene and pos­sesses antibac­te­r­ial activ­ity, great for those with acne and rosacea.

Aloe Bar­baden­sis (Aloe) Leaf Juice

This is a clas­sic wound healer, most com­monly used for the treat­ment of sun­burns (who hasn’t seen those giant tubs of green-dyed goop in stores?). What is per­haps less com­monly known is that aloe vera increases skin hydra­tion, reduces water loss, and helps main­tain the integrity of the skin bar­rier, which is essen­tial for every­one, espe­cially those with dry skin, dry patches, or acne.

Mal­todex­trin

A com­pletely safe, non-toxic poly­sac­cha­ride derived from starch that helps to sta­bi­lize skin care for­mu­la­tions. In a study in 2000, mal­todex­trin was found to enhance anti-aging activ­ity of weak acids and reduce skin irri­ta­tion asso­ci­ated with their use.

Prickly Pear Stem Extract (Opun­tia Ficus-Indica)

Prickly pear is a pow­er­ful anti-inflammatory, and has long been con­sumed for its nutri­tional value and anti-aging abilities.

Goji Berry (Lycium Barbarum)

Goji berry has the incred­i­ble abil­ity to pro­tect the skin from UV dam­age and increase the skin’s super­ox­ide dis­mu­tase activ­ity, reduc­ing free rad­i­cal dam­age and keep­ing the skin youth­ful, firm, and resilient. Fun fact: super­ox­ide dis­mu­tase plays a key antiox­i­dant role in the body, pre­vent­ing oxida­tive stress and even play­ing a role in longevity. Sign me up!

Hyaluronic Acid

This ingre­di­ent occurs nat­u­rally in our bod­ies, and keeps skin plump, firm, and hydrated because of it’s incred­i­ble moisture-binding abil­i­ties. In fact, it’s one of the main rea­sons baby’s have such plump, beau­ti­fully tex­tured skin. I make sure to use at least one hyaluronic acid-containing prod­uct per day in order to increases my skin’s hydra­tion (which pro­tects against fine lines and blem­ishes) and also pro­tect against free rad­i­cal dam­age (which pre­vents signs of aging).

Dehy­droacetic Acid & Ben­zyl Alcohol

These two ingre­di­ents might sound scary, but they are not. They are both nat­u­rally derived and syn­the­sized preser­v­a­tives that are safe and non­toxic. Don’t be scared of the word syn­the­sized, either – rose hydrosol is a syn­the­sized from roses and water, tea is syn­the­sized from boil­ing water and the leaves/stems/etc. of a plant. Both have been approved for top­i­cal and inter­nal use by the FDA, ECOCERT, NSF, and Whole Foods. You might have seen that ben­zyl alco­hol is rated 5 from the EWG as a con­tact aller­gen, yet it’s impor­tant to read the details…it is rated a 5 at lev­els nearly 10 times higher than is used in cos­metic for­mu­la­tions. Keep in mind that some per­sonal care prod­ucts use ben­zyl alco­hol in the 5% range of a for­mu­la­tion and they are still tested safe and non-irritating. MUN Anarose con­tains less than 0.5%. Sev­eral years ago, I used to believe that nat­ural = safe and syn­thetic = bad but this is not the case at all. Remem­ber that just because some­thing is nat­ural does not auto­mat­i­cally make it safe (poi­son ivy, arsenic, potassium-40 any­one?), and just because some­thing is chem­i­cally syn­the­sized or derived does not make it harm­ful (peni­cillin, insulin for example).

So does their list of prod­uct claims match up to my expe­ri­ence and results?

* Hydrates skin with an all-day effect. Yes! And it works beau­ti­fully with any facial oil or mois­tur­izer. * Soft­ens and mois­tur­izes skin. Yep, and it makes a big dif­fer­ence in how well your mois­tur­izer sinks in. * Refreshes skin, giv­ing it a nat­ural glow. Yes, my skin felt instantly calm and cool after apply­ing. * Soothes, smoothes and com­forts areas prone to dry­ness and fine lines. Def­i­nitely. * Helps enhance per­for­mance of mois­tur­iz­ers and anti-aging treat­ments. Yes (see above). * De-pollutes and pro­tects against envi­ron­men­tal dam­age. This is backed by sci­en­tific data on the ingre­di­ents, so yes. * Achieves opti­mum results when used with No. 1 Aknari Bright­en­ing Youth Serum. Yes (see above).

10% Off + Free Ship­ping For Epic Beauty Guide Readers!

MUN No. 11 Anarose is $68 for 3.38 oz./100 ml and lasts me about 3 months of twice daily use. It’s travel-friendly and can be brought in your carry-on lug­gage. MUN has gra­ciously given a spe­cial code just for Epic Beauty Guide read­ers.  Go to munskin.com and enter code epicbeau­ty­mun at check­out for 10% off and free ship­ping any­where in the USA. 

Enjoy!