Glow Recipe NYC Pop-Up Tour & Haul | Beauty in the City
If you're not a fan of K-beauty (how dare you) or you aren't American (#merica) then you might not have heard of Glow Recipe, an e-retailer and distributor that specializes in luxury Korean beauty products. After appearing on Shark Tank sometime in 2015, they shot to fame and have become a household name in the online K-beauty community.
On top of running their own store where they sell brands like Whamisa, Huxley, and Leejiham they also work as curators of Korean beauty products for other retailers. If you've ever browsed the K-beauty section at Sephora you may have noticed that some of the products are labeled as "Glow Recipe curations." For example all the way on the bottom of the product description of the Blithe green tea splash mask, Sephora offers this little blurb:
"Curated by Glow Recipe, the go-to for the best Korean beauty innovations. Glow Recipe is at the forefront of the latest K-beauty trends, identifying and bringing only top quality products and skin care secrets stateside. Get your glow on!"
As you might have guessed from my fan-girly intro, I was ecstatic to hear they were opening up a pop-up in the city! I'm bummed I didn't make time to visit on opening day (which I'll briefly talk about later) but it was still exciting to go a week after opening! Here's my tour of the studio as well as a small-ish haul 😉
Part I: Glow Studio Downtown Pop-Up
When I first stopped by the pop-up they were filming a bit for their site. After silently browsing for a minute or two I decided to leave and come back a bit later. As I took a walk around the block I ended up stopping by Dominque Ansel Bakery (aka the home of the cronut). After spending 10 minutes in line I said fuck it, I don't want to spend $7 for one freakin' eclair and headed back to the pop-up. I ended up spending the $7 on a Blossom Jeju sheet mask which if I must say so myself, was a much better purchase.
The pop-up is located in Soho at 452 W. Broadway, New York, New York. If you're looking it up on google maps, it's in the space where Philosophy Di Alberta Ferretti used to be. Their hours are Monday to Saturday from 10 AM to 8 PM and Sundays 11 AM to 6 PM. Their opening day was March 1st and they'll remain open for the rest of the month.
The exterior of the pop-up is so cute and on brand! They have huge cartoons of some of their best-sellers on the windows plus a flag that you can spot half a block away.
Once you step inside you'll notice that the space isn't the largest, but it is jam packed with K-beauty goodies. Smack dab center in the middle of the space is a table stacked high with their starter kits, sheet masks, and travel sized minis. While they have pricier starter kits which contain a few of their best-selling items, they also had their "Glow Starter Kit" which includes 5 travel sized Whamisa and Huxley samples! Bonus: the kit is also available online here 😏
In addition to the starter sets, they also sheet masks by Whamisa, Blossom Jeju, J. one, and Polatam as well as a few other brands. The last thing on the center table were travel sized minis of the J. One jelly pack, the Whamisa floral toner, and the Polatam deep moist cream as well as two trios of Huxley minis. The individual minis were priced at $2-$3 whereas the Huxley trios were $9-$10.
Right at the front of the store to the right of the door was a tall shelf showing off some of their most popular items, organized by steps.
The rest of the products are found on wall shelves accompanied by graphics of various vanities, chaise lounges, and cheeky, skincare related mottos. Most of the products were categorized by skin type so there was a wall for oily skin, combo skin, dry skin, and anti-aging skin. They also had suggested routines for each skin type featuring their products. And for the products that weren't part of the setup routines there were mini place cards indicating their price, a short description, and their purpose. I loved that they had testers out for every product because it's hard if not impossible to try out most of these products before buying!
They also had a little table at the back that had bags and accessories by Patricia Chang. And even further back was a huge-perfect-for-selfie-taking mirror. The set of stairs in my selfie lead up to the second floor, which is where their events take place! If you're curious about attending, check out Glow Recipe's Instagram or Facebook page.
Last but not least there were two cardboard boxes on the floor including items specially marked as $10 or $5. I was shocked to see some of the items in the boxes because they were not brands found on the Glow Recipe site! The $10 box included every variety of the Banila Co. cleansing balms whereas the $5 box was filled with Blithe sheet masks and Dr. Oracle a-thera peeling sticks amongst other things.
The staff were also so welcoming! When I wanted to silently browse, I was left alone but when I had questions they were eager to help. I actually had a mini internal fangirl moment when Sarah (one of the founders of Glow Recipe, if you're a fan of Gothamista you might recognize her from some of Renee's videos) was kind enough to chat with me about the Huxley anti-gravity cream. She was honestly so helpful and so humble, and in turn it made me into an even bigger Glow Recipe fangirl.
Part II: Haul Time
The first thing that caught my eyes were all the Huxley minis. I've been so eager to try out the brand after seeing them over on
! They had two mini sets and of course I picked up both. I believe the set with the 3 treatments was $9 and the set with the 3 different steps was $10.
Unfortunately neither set is available on their website. When I visited on Tuesday Sarah said the tray of Huxley kits that on the floor was the last batch they had so if you're looking to grab some, I would suggest running there ASAP!
The 3 treatment set includes minis of the Huxley oil essence, light & more oil, and grab water essence.
The 3 step set includes minis of the Huxley grab water essence, anti-gravity cream, and extract it toner.
Side note: If you're interested in Huxley and happen to live on the West Coast, I recommend checking out the K-beauty pop-up at Nordstrom! While all the Huxley products are available online at Nordstrom here, you can go in stores and swatch samples of them at certain locations (all of which seem to be on the West Coast.)
The one other mini I bought was the Polatam deep moist cream. I meant to also purchase the Whamisa toner but stupidly put it back. If there's still any left during my next visit I'll definitely buy one!
Even though I really don't need any more sheet masks, I bought one of the Blossom Jeju brightening vitamin essence petal masks. I figure it's my one chance to try one without paying crazy shipping costs so I might as well take advantage.
Last but not least I snatched up two items from the $10 bin-- the Skinrx Lab madecera essence toner
($32 value) and the Banila Co. clean it zero purity cleansing balm ($25 value.) Neither brand is sold on the Glow Recipe site but both items have been on my radar and I couldn't resist them for $10 🙈.
Although I'm satisfied with my haul, I'm a bit bummed at missing out on the opening day happy hour sales! Certain items were up to 70% off! The one deal I'm the most bummed about missing are the Blithe splash masks which were on sale for around $14!
At the moment all the prices for their full size items are the same as the prices on their site. On the bright side, I did receive 10% off at checkout thanks to their loyalty card! When the cashier first offered the loyalty card I didn't think anything of it because the store is only open for one month, realistically how many times am I going to shop there? But when I got home and opened up the card, or rather what they call the Glow Recipe Passport I noticed that it wasn't your standard loyalty card!
For each visit to the pop up, you get a different reward. On your first visit you get 10% off, on your second visit you get 20% off, on your third visit sheet masks are BOGO, etc.
In addition to the loyalty card, the cashier was also kind enough to throw in some Blithe samples! When I got home I noticed that the splash mask samples came with a cute, little booklet sharing info on all the steps of a potential K-beauty inspired skincare routine.
If you don't live near NYC and are bummed to be missing out on all the promotions, don't fret! You can still get 10% off your first $50 purchase by signing up for their newsletter or alternatively you can get
15% off through my referral link here
(FYI: I'll get 200 glow points if you do end up purchasing anything through this link.) Also be sure to follow along on their Instagram because many of the promotions they've been offering in store are also available online!