In my post on seasonal skincare tweaks (you can read that in full here) I talked about some of the things I change in my routine when autumn gets into full swing. Swapping lighter moisturisers for richer ones, for example, to counteract the drying effects of colder weather and central heating.
Arguably the most important tip in that post was the one that advised stepping back from very potent, powerful active ingredients if your skin is feeling on the irritable side. Strong vitamin C serums, intense acid peels, advanced retinoids – shelve them for a bit until your face feels robust enough to use them again. Which might be a week later, or a month later, or might be never. My general thinking being that if your skin barrier is compromised and your face is feeling sensitive and dry and tight, then why – for want of a better phrase – would you rub salt in the wound? Why put harsh exfoliants onto skin that might already be over-exfoliated? Why force your skin into emergency repair mode when it’s already struggling to protect itself?
It would be like having terrible flu and thinking, I know what I need: a session in the ice bath followed by eight double gin and tonics and a Boxercise class.
Or something.
I do have some fleeting and not-so-fleeting concerns that things have gone a bit over the top in terms of skincare strengths. I think it’s great that we have hugely effective products at our fingertips – products we don’t need a prescription for and that don’t cost hundreds and hundreds of pounds – but there’s a downside to this new level of accessibility. And that is the fact that there’s nobody standing over the person buying it all saying “DO NOT USE ALL OF THIS IN ONE ROUTINE OR YOUR FACE WILL LITERALLY CATCH FIRE AND THEN FALL OFF AND YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO WEAR MAKEUP FOR A YEAR”.
Alright, so I’m being relatively dramatic here but it would be quite easy to gather up a handful of readily available skincare products – acid peel pads, a pokey vitamin c, retinol in a particularly user-unfriendly formula – and use them as weapons of face destruction. I feel as though certain active ingredient concentrations have increased noticeably over the years that I’ve been writing about beauty and I definitely have to be more careful now, when I’m testing products, than I had to be back at the start.
(I mean yes, the fact that my face is older could have something to do with it – it’s probably sick of my shit by now, the daily tinkering around and the constant “let’s try something new!” – but let’s ignore that for the moment.)
So: what if you want mega-effective products but not the potential irritation? What if you want to step back from your paint-stripper peel pads but still want something that’ll give you a good glow? Or what if your skin is permanently just a little bit on the sensitive side? Doesn’t do well with retinoids or Vitamin C? What if – and this is most of my non-beauty-industry friends – you’re simply not bothered about using the absolute strongest stuff you can possibly get your hands on, you just want to keep your skin on an even keel but still want to be safe in the knowledge that you have a highly effective skincare routine? Box ticked?
I have some suggestions for you. I’ve tried and tested the following products to the nth degree and feel that they are all nicely gentle on skin that’s more delicate, yet don’t sacrifice potency or effectiveness. They’re all products I regularly use in my own routine, whether my skin is feeling delicate or not – I don’t really subscribe to the “blast your face off” skincare method, preferring to keep things balanced, these days – and they are brilliant bits to invest in if you want a routine that still packs a punch but does it with very furry inflatable boxing gloves on.
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I talk about this a lot. A very gently daily exfoliating liquid that you swipe over skin after cleansing, it has been formulated with a blend of Alpha Hydroxy Acids and Beta Hydroxy Acids to make skin glow (the AHAs) and to decongest (the BHAs). The ingredients have been balanced “just so” to maximise effects and minimise irritation. If peel pads usually make your skin tingle a bit too much, this is a brilliant (and very affordable) swap.
Placid Daily Exfoliant is here*.
If anything is going to irritate me then it’ll be an unfamiliar vitamin c serum. I tend to be quite hardy with retinoids, in general, but baste me in a vitamin c product that doesn’t quite agree with my face and I’ll be as irritable as a bear in a swarm of bees for the entire day.
No such problems with the very sophisticated Skin Rocks serum, “The Antioxidant”. It has more tolerable levels of vitamin c in the formula but clever ways of boosting it and reducing the risk of irritation. It’s impressive. If you’ve previously invested in pricey high-performance antioxidant serums but found them to be incompatible with your skin then this could be the ticket.
The Antioxidant is here*
If high-strength retinoids tend to send your skin into dryness/itchiness meltdown then make sure you’re introducing them very slowly – every few days to start with, or even once a week. If you still can’t seem to tolerate them but want to reap the benefits of a good retinol product then try a cream formula rather than a serum. I’ve found that the cream acts as a bit of a buffer – it’s almost feels as though you’re putting out the fire as it happens, though I wish I could think of a less alarming way of explaining it. Haha.
I get on incredibly well with the RoC retinol products – the Retinol Correxion hydrating cream (gold pot) is SO moisturising that you would be hard pressed to experience any sort of dryness or tightness or flaking. (Can be common side effects of retinoid usage, if you don’t go in carefully.)
Retinol Correxion is here*.
You might be wondering why anyone at all bothers with retinoids after all of my weird warnings: they bother with it because it’s widely considered to be the “gold standard” skincare ingredient that addresses (nearly) all skin woes. Lines, crevices, unevenness of tone, loss of firmness, dullness: you name it, it has usually been extensively proven to help with it. So it’s a brilliant one to incorporate into your routine if you’re not at all fussed by skincare but want something that will “actually make a difference”. And on that note, we also have:
Retinol + HPR is here*.
Some extra notes:
A brand I really rate for when skin is generally on the sensitive side and I want to be able to trust everything and anything on their website: Pai. I fell in love with Pai products when I was still modelling and I couldn’t find a single eye cream that didn’t sting the patch of weird rawness I constantly had under my left eye. They started off with very few products and then the range gradually expanded until there were things like AHA masks and spot treatments and none of them ever left my skin feeling remotely dodgy.
I currently have a real thing for their Vitamin C day cream. (Actually another great one if you usually find vitamin c products to be a bit irritating!)
Pai C-2 Believe Moisturizer is here*.
Another current favourite that tenuously ties in with this post: the Avene Hyaluron Activ B3. Really very concentrated hydration in a gentle formula.
Hyaluron Activ B3 Serum is here*.
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