It’s around Memorial Day Weekend every year that we all rejoice in the return of our fashionable whites. What goes best with a crisp white sundress? A glowing tan! Many of us still turn to sunbeds to get bronzed, but at what cost?

Stephanie’s tanning background: I went to college in New Jersey—The Garden State, and the home of the Jersey Shore. I definitely felt the pressure and desire to be tan. Pale was not an option. Over my four years of college, I don’t want to think about the couple thousands of dollars I must have spent at tanning salons. It was only when my dermatologist said I had to have a mole removed on my right shoulder that I questioned my tanning addiction. That was about two years ago. I knew about skin cancer, I just didn’t think it could happen to me. I had so many questions:

What Is Melanoma?
Melaoma is the most dangerous form of skin cancer. Your melanocyte cells produce melanin, or your skin pigment. When your skin is exposed to ultraviolet, UV radiation (aka the sun and tanning bulbs) melanin is produced to protect your skin, i.e turning your skin darker. Over exposure to UV rays causes temporary, but skin damaging sunburn.

How serious is it?
Although melanoma accounts for only about five percent of all skin cancer cases, it causes 77 percent of all skin cancer-related deaths (according to the American Cancer Society). It accounts for five percent of all cancers in men and four percent of all cancers in women. The lifetime risk of developing melanoma has risen and continues to rise.

How to reduce your risk?

Best Advice: Don’t wait. Have a professional check out anything specious asap. Better safe than sorry.

After my mole was removed, it was tested and came back negative! Thank goodness. Since my cancer scare, I have quit UV tanning and embraced the airbrush tan with open arms. I don’t know why more people don’t do it. It’s practically instant gratification every time. You can control how tan you want to be and if you spray tan once every 2-3 weeks, it’s cheaper then tanning in a sunbed. I go spray tanning now throughout the year, usually in the winter I’ll go for a “Light” shade and wait longer between applications. In the spring, I opt for a brozned, “Medium” and right around MDW I up the bronze and go for a “Dark” beach ready shade and re-up usually every 10-14 days.  Save money and your tan by mositurizing after showers with a “build-a-tan” product.

Plus, if you spray tan instead of fake-and-bake, you’ll reduce your risk of cancer. If you’re not going to quit tanning for melanoma’s sake, remember this: tanning robs your skin of moisture and elasticity, leaving you with premature fine lines and age spots. You may look tan now, but you’ll look older, faster. Is tanning still worth the risk? You be the judge. 

Guest contributor: Healing Lifestyles & Spas

Starting to plan your spring wardrobe? Stay away from dangerous tanning beds and sprays!

No doubt you’ll need a little bronze to go with that bare skin. Not so fast—tanning beds, sunless tanning pills and sunless tanners with toxic chemical ingredients are harmful to your health and taking a beating right now… for good reason!

For a safe way to get a sunny glow, try a $50 sunless tan for Spa Week—such as at the chic Planet Beach spa locations or Giannillo in NYC—all health-approved, or try these natural self-tanners with active ingredients from corn, sugar beets and sugar cane.  And always remember to avoid the sun right after using self-tanners!

Not into slathering anything on your skin? Try eating foods that have been shown to produce a golden glow!

Up your intake of foods rich in carotenoids—especially cantaloupe, apricots, carrots, peppers and spinach. Carotenoids can give skin a light golden color while providing antioxidants that protect it from sun damage. In about a month, a diet packed with carotenoid-rich fruits and veggies can make a noticeable change in your skin tone and color.

“We found people always preferred the golden effect from diet to the darker effect from the sun,” said Ian Stephen, a Bristol University experimental psychologist who studied the effects of carotenoids on skin.

Get healthy, bronze skin the natural way and look radiant in your new spring duds!

You could win a tan contest against this bottle.

The Little Luxury: Maui Babe Browning Lotion

Relationship status: Thoroughly addicted since introduced 6 years ago, cannot spend a summer or a vacation without it.

Alias: Tanning’s Holy Grail

What is Maui Babe: The greatest tanning lotion known to man. Made in Hawaii with coffee, iodine, oil, lots of love and other top secret ingredients.

Does it do what it says it’ll do? YES. You rub it on your skin like lotion, you lay in the sun, and you watch yourself get tan. It doesn’t burn you, it BROWNS. It’s actually changed the way my skin takes in the sun– even when I’m in the sun without Maui Babe, it seems like after all these years my skin has been trained to get brown rather than burned.

The bottle says it’s fast. How fast could it be? I see tan lines within 10 minutes. 

But… isn’t tanning bad for you? Aren’t you supposed to be telling me wear SPF 50 and get a damage-erasing facial with one of your spa deals or something? Of course. I was getting there. You should definitely wear sunscreen under your Babe to protect your skin while you brown it… Maui Babe makes an SPF 30 lotion.We can’t stop you from tanning, so at least do it safely. (I’ll let you decide on your own if you wanted to try one of those facial deals.)

What does it smell like? Feel like? I thought you’d never ask. It smells like a mix of coffee, cocoa, oil and beach. Some people love it, some people would rather save the smell for their mocha latte. It’s a thick and goopy cream that freaks a lot people out.

Those bottles look a little ghetto: Watch your mouth. 

Does the brown rub off on your clothes? Yes. Every time. BUT! It comes right out in the wash, no problem. I’ve never gotten a permanent Babe stain, but I can’t imagine I’d be that upset if I did.

Proving love, time and again: I once made my entire family– including my immobile grandmother, drive over an hour to go to the nearest store in Florida that carried The Babe. I also once had a shipment practically over-nighted from Hawaii to arrive before leaving for a vacation.

Where can I get it? Back in the good old days, you could only order it from MauiBabe.com or go to Maui to pick it up. Maui Babe was a true rarity. Now you can find it all over. I’ll never forget the day I walked into Duane Reade on 34th and 3rd in Manhattan, and to my horror, sitting right there on the shelf among the lowly Banana Boats and Coppertones, sat a row of my beautiful Babe. I felt so responsible, so connected, so deceived, and SO overwhelmed, that I stood there in Duane Reade at 2 in the morning convincing people in line to buy Maui Babe until they sold out entirely. 

The price of the perfect suntan:  $13.99 for a 4 oz bottle, $23 for an 8 oz at Mauibabe.com. Prices have doubled over the last few years, which I guess they’ve earned. You may also consider buying a set that includes Sunscreen and/or their After Sun formula. Or, buy Babe in bulk. 

Social Babe: I found them on Twitter and Facebook today! Couldn’t be more excited.

The Real Deal: Tomorrow I am going on my first vacation without Maui Babe in tow… because I am going to Maui! Of all the reasons I’m excited, number one might be to feel the glorious satisfaction of buying and using Maui Babe exactly where God intended. 

Hot Stone Scale: 6 out of 6

This Little Luxury Report was brought to you by: Michelle

Photo by Zsuzsanna Kilián

The economy has people exploring a wide variety of DIY projects, from revamping old wardrobes to at-home beauty treatments. While I’m all for creativity, I’m curious more than anything about this recipe I found for self-tanning, here’s a snippet:

Ingredients:
1 cup water
3 black tea bags
2 tablespoons whole cloves
2 cups brown henna or another color that looks good for your skin tone.

If anyone gives this a shot please let us know!

How will you welcome the warm weather? And you better not say spring cleaning! Keeping Up with the Huxtables posted a list of their top 10 ways to “keep up” and enhance your look for the spring.

Among her ideas I know which ones I’ll definitely get to (“10. Take me time so that you are relaxed. Stress causes break outs on your skin, wrinkles, and bags under your eyes from lack of sleep. You do not want stress to effect how beautiful you are!”) and, due to my geographical relocation, probably won’t be keeping up with (“8. Tanned. Add a little color to your life, leaving you glowing for the world to see.”)

But my favorite of course is “4. Spa treatment. Taking a spa day is always relaxing for the mind, body, and soul.” I couldn’t agree more. When your body feels refreshed, everything else will follow!

And what do you know? Starting THIS MONDAY, March 16th, our list of participating Spa Week locations will be up on the site and ready to take appointments. Happy Springing!