When did getting older ever become a bad thing?  I remember (like it was yesterday!) being a frustrated teenager and counting down the years until I was 18 and officially became an adult.  Even in my 20s, I looked forward to my birthday every year.  Every year was a step towards my education or career goals.  Every year provided more knowledge, more experiences, more adventures, more confidence, and more security!

But now I am officially getting older, and it is not such a good thing anymore.  Somehow time has crept up, and I suddenly woke up to find myself in my mid-30s, although I still feel like I’m 25, and often get mistaken for it.  I take pride in looking like I’m still in my 20s, and goddamn it, I will maintain it as long as humanly possible!  (Without looking like a plastic freak with a pulled-apart face like overstretched mozzarella – you know what I’m talking about.)

In an effort to maintain my appearance – and most importantly my skin – for as long as possible, I decided to start making a conscience effort to research and experiment with products specifically targeted for anti-aging.  I still use my snail cream every day (and sometimes nights too), which has some anti-aging benefits because it aids in cell turnover.  But it was time to start adding some serious anti-aging ingredients into the mix!

So about 6 months ago, I looked to see what one of my favorite brands – Mizon – had to offer, in the hopes of adding yet another Korean magic potion to my arsenal of beauty products.

The first on my list to try??  *Drumroll please~~* Mizon Original Skin Energy Ampoules!  More specifically, three of them at once! Peptide 500, Placenta 45, and Collagen 100.  Because why?? Because you either go big or you go home, that’s why!

Well really, I chose all three because I couldn’t decide which one to try first.  I looked at a lot of different products from a lot of different brands, but decided to go with Mizon because they’ve continued to impress me with their high quality ingredients, great price, and wonderful results.

I bought all of these off of en.koreadepart.com – a great website for getting products direct from Korea, even though their regular shipping takes. an. insanely. long. time.  They were around $20 each, incredibly cheap for such great quality anti-aging products.

They come in beautiful glass bottles with a stopper, and are really nice to use.  Each product is completely clear and slightly oily and sticky (like most ampoules), but absorbs nicely into the skin after a few minutes.

But adding three additional products to my nightly skincare regimen at once noticeably made everything take a lot longer… and ain’t nobody got time for that!  As I mentioned earlier, I’m getting old! Since they blended so well with each other, I quickly decided that in order to save time every night, I would just dump them all together into one single bottle.

And voila!  My little green bottle of Forever Youth Tonic courtesy of Mizon!

Every night I sprinkle a few drops here and there and I feel the magic work!

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Closer look into some of the star ingredients:

Copper tripeptide-1: Not gonna lie, this is probably the star ingredient out of all three ampoules.  This is the work horse.  Copper peptides are well researched and studied (especially in the US), and known to be a great anti-aging ingredient as it promotes collagen and elastin production in the skin.  And in case you didn’t know, collagen and elastin is what makes your skin firm and supple.  As your skin ages, it depletes in collagen and elastin, resulting in saggy, crepey skin.  However, don’t use this as an excuse to go crazy with the copper peptides.  Ingesting or applying too much can be harmful.  I would just stick with one or two products that contain the ingredients.

Placental protein: Ok, so this is a little gross, I’ll admit.  But I’ve slathered snail mucin and starfish essence on my face, so I’m not going to shy away from an ingredient without trying it first!  As you can imagine, this placental protein is harvested from animals, most likely pigs (because pig skin is eerily similar in structure to human skin).  Mizon markets this product as providing essential amino acids and minerals to the skin (read: nutrition), but I couldn’t really find anything to back this up.  I did find one warning about possible hormone disruption, but nothing that caused any real alarms for me.

Collagen: So this ingredient I was actually surprised to find may not benefit you very much.  I would have assumed that topically applying collagen would be good to boost and maintain your collagen levels – but research shows this may not be the case.  When applied topically, the actual collagen protein is too big to absorb into the layers of your skin, therefore having very little effect.  It may only be beneficial as a superficial moisturizer, and not much more.  There’s a lot more evidence that actually eating collagen (and no, I am not telling you to eat this ampoule!) is more beneficial to producing collagen levels in the skin.

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*How to use*

I like to apply this product at night, after my Paula’s Choice 2% BHA liquid.  I put a few drops in my hand and pat it around my face, neck, and décolletage.  I let it absorb for a few minutes, then follow it with moisturizer.

If you’re not using an AHA or BHA exfoliant, then I would apply this immediately after washing your face and applying a toner and/or essence.

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I’ve been using this product for about 6 months, and no adverse reactions so far!  Before I used this product, I’ve noticed a little section in the center of my neck that has started to become crepey.  Right now it’s still too early to tell whether this product is helping it, but some more time will tell! I believe it is getting a little better, but I don’t like to jump to conclusions until I can see visible results that I’m certain of.  So stay tuned!  I may include an update to this post soon.

I do believe, however, based on the ingredients and research I’ve done, that the best ampoule in this arsenal actually is the Peptide 500 one.  When I run out of this product, I think I’ll only rebuy the Peptide ampoule.  I’ll likely shelve the placenta and collagen ones and possibly revisit them if there’s more evidence that comes out in the future confirming that they’re actually really beneficial for the skin.

Overall:

Mizon does it again!  Always impressed by this company and it’s quality products.  However, if you want to be more conservative, you may want to just go with the Peptide ampoule instead of dishing out money for all 3.

Pros: High percentage of its *star* ingredient, no fragrance, absorbs nicely, no acne-triggering ingredients, not very expensive.

Cons: Lack of real research and evidence of whether placental protein or collagen is actually effective anti-aging products.

Total score: 8/10

Ingredients: 6/10 (I give the copper peptides 10/10, but bumped the overall grade down a little because no real evidence that placental protein or collagen is really that effective.)

Quality: 10/10 (Really impressed with the quantity and quality of these ampoules though!)

Wear: 10/10 (Absorbs nicely and feels very moisturizing.)

Price: 10/10 (Really great value for an anti-aging product – that shit is never cheap! But with Mizon, you know you’re getting a great amount of quality ingredients for your money.)