In the quest for the perfect self tan, it may prove true that less is more in the end if you’re looking to achieve a long lasting, naturally fading and natural looking sunless tan.  My sister actually has practiced this way of applying self tanner for a while, and she swears that it is the reason no one can guess that she got the tan from a lotion, not from the real sun or a tanning booth (although I do believe she occasionally still visits a tanning booth -she has not had the same problems as me – yet!)

She says that she applies self tanner nearly every day, except she combines a little bit with her regular daily lotion instead of using the pure concentrated lotion that comes in the tubes or bottles by itself.  While she says that it does not give her instant deep color, the color builds slowly, and therefore, since it goes on essentially in layers, like a real tan would, it wears much better, fades more like a real tan instead of the sometimes freckly looking fading that pure self tanner can give, and looks much more realistic because it’s not dosing you with the high amounts of the self tanning agent all at once, so there’s less instance of getting that “orange” color everyone finds such a turnoff in the self tanning world.

I’ll admit, I don’t have the patience she does to lather it in with my lotion all the time, but I do try to use a lighter concentraion self tanner now, and use it more often, to get the layering effect.  I find the smell to be annoying, and sometimes I don’t like the feeling of having self tanner on my skin, so I guess that’s my way of making it less time I have to deal with the smell and feel.  Self tanners are not all alike either, so some do help build that tan eventually.