Why clean lashes hold better
The instinct is that water and rubbing must be bad for a bond, so the careful thing is to leave them alone. It is exactly backwards after the first two days.
Your lash line produces sebum continuously, and skin cells shed into it. Left alone, that builds into a film at the base of every extension, sitting between the adhesive and the natural lash and slowly breaking the bond. It also feeds the mites that live in everybody’s lash follicles, which is unpleasant to think about and is a real cause of the itching people attribute to an adhesive allergy.
Sets on people who wash daily hold noticeably better than sets on people who are frightened of them. It is the most reliable difference we see between one client and another, ahead of set type, adhesive, or anything we do at the chair.
How to actually do it
Foaming cleanser onto a soft brush, closed eye, brush downward and along the lash line rather than at the tips. Rinse with cool water, pat, then dry with a fan or the cool setting of a hairdryer at arm’s length and brush through with a spoolie once dry.
Thirty seconds a day and it does more than everything else on this page combined.
The oil list
Worth actually checking the bottles. Cleansing balms and oils, obviously. Most micellar waters. Almost all waterproof-makeup removers. Coconut oil, argan, castor, and any face oil. A lot of eye creams. Sunscreens vary and mineral ones are usually fine.
If in doubt, keep it below the brow bone and off the lid.