Master Your Moisture Strategy

 

You’re probably already participating in skincare’s latest trend: multi-moisturizing. You’ve just never thought of it in those terms. Do you use an eye cream plus a moisturizer? If you said yes, you’re multi-moisturizing. Let’s look closer at the whys and hows of this multi-tasking scenario to understand how to layer up or tailor by zone for optimal moisture and your healthiest skin.

 

Why would you consider more than one moisturizer?

 

Different areas of your skin have different needs. Your skin is thinner and more prone to dryness around the eyes. For many people, skin tends to be oilier on the forehead, nose, and chin (the T-zone).

 

Have you ever noticed you breakout mostly around the chin (hormonal acne)? Or your cheeks and neck are drier than the rest of your face? And now, with masks becoming a necessary fashion accessory, there is the potential for irritation that requires soothing elements.

 

Giving special attention to the specific needs of those areas, whether through layering up or tailoring your product by zone, can go a long way to keeping your skin barrier healthy and resilient. 

 

First, let’s make sure you understand the basic facts about moisturizers before trying to mix and match your perfect combo.

 

The job of a moisturizer is to bolster the skin barrier and protect the skin from irritation and environmental stressors. Moisturizers use lipids, humectants, emollients, occlusive elements, and ceramides to absorb and retain water in the skin.

 

Humectants attract water from the deeper layers of the dermis and from the environment to hydrate the dermis. Ingredients like honey, urea, glycols, glycerin, lactic acid, and hyaluronic acid, aloe, and algae extract are all humectants.

 

Emollients are lipids, fatty acids, and oils, things like botanical oils, including grape seed or olive oil. These ingredients strengthen the skin matrix, help reduce water loss and make skin softer and smoother.

 

Occlusives act as a hydrophobic barrier over the skin to seal in moisture and protect the skin barrier. These include silicones, petrolatum, paraffin, and mineral oil. Occlusive ingredients are essential for sealing in moisture, but some can cross the line to sealing pores. Occlusives that are comedogenic include cocoa butter, synthetic lanolin, myristyl myristate, octyl stearate, and sodium lauryl sulfate.

 

Finally, remember that moisture doesn’t have to come in the form of a cream, gel, or lotion. Toners and serums can score high on the moisture scale too.

 

How to choose the right moisture combo for your skin type.

 

Dry Skin

Don’t confuse dry skin with dehydration, which is a skin condition. In dry skin, the follicles aren’t producing enough sebum, and/or the cells aren’t retaining adequate moisture. Dehydration occurs when water is lost from the skin through a process known as transepidermal water loss (TEWL). A dry climate or weakened skin barrier are contributors to water loss.

 

Put simply, dry skin lacks oil. Dehydrated skin lacks water. Dry skin needs emollients. Dehydrated skin needs humectants to draw in water but may also need emollients to help retain the moisture.

 

• Dry skin has an excess of dead skin cells, which block moisture from entering the skin. Start with a hydrating toner to remove dead skin cells and allow hydrating elements to reach the dermis. Mandelic acid-based Skin Nourishing Toner gently removes cellular debris, infuses the skin with moisture, and clears the way for additional products to be more readily absorbed.
• Emollient-rich Marine Skin Nourishing Cream is an intensely nourishing blend of antioxidants marine minerals, amino acids, sea proteins, and grape seed oil to replenish and restore suppleness and elasticity to dry skin. 
• For dehydrated skin, use Totaloe Calming and Hydrating Gel, a skin-quenching and nourishing formula of whole leaf aloe, niacinamide, sea algae extract, and green tea extract.
• You can layer the two moisturizers for the ultimate hydration and lipid nourishment. The lighter consistency Totaloe goes on first. Let it soak in and dry. Then add Marine Skin Nourishing Cream on top to seal in moisture.
• Use Wink Eye Rejuvenation Cream around the eye area. For an instant firming effect, layer Totaloe underneath Wink.

 

Combination Skin

Oily on the forehead, nose, and chin. Dry on the cheeks. The perfect conditions for multiple moisturizers. Your cheeks need an oil-factor (emollient), your T-zone does not.

 

• Apply Totaloe Calming and Hydrating Gel to the T-Zone. It adds hydration while helping to reduce sebum.
• Apply Marine Skin Nourishing Cream to the cheek area to replace and retain moisture. It contains non-comedogenic oils and collagen-loving amino acids and sea proteins in a lightweight, barrier-boosting formula.
• Use Wink Eye Rejuvenation Cream around the eye area. For an instant firming effect, layer Totaloe underneath Wink.

 

Oily or Acne-Prone Skin

Unless you have dry skin, which is uncommon with acne, you should be using little to no moisturizer during active acne treatment. Acne products are designed to mildly irritate the skin to cause peeling down inside the pore and to kill bacteria. Adding moisture can interfere with the process and slow clearing. However, if the drying from acne treatment feels excessive, you may want to add moisture, but not oil.

• Use Daily Repair Pads to lift dead skin cells, refine surface texture, and balance the skin’s acid mantle. These pre-moistened pads are soaked with a hydrating and healing blend of mandelic acid, niacinamide, and anti-inflammatory salicylic acid, plus humectants lactic acid and glycine.
• Totaloe Calming and Hydrating Gel will pull water into the skin to help keep the skin barrier healthy without interfering with acne treatment. It also helps to reduce sebum and has potent healing and anti-inflammatory properties.
• To protect skin from UV exposure, which can increase sebum and inflammation, use Day Treatment Lotion SPF 15 in the morning on top of Totaloe or alone.

 

Sensitive or Rosacea Skin

Sensitive skin is usually dry skin and often thinner skin with blood vessels closer to the surface, which can mean more redness. Emollient, calming, and nourishing ingredients are essential for this highly reactive type.

• Soothe and hydrate with calming and clarifying Skin Nourishing Toner. It’s loaded with cell-renewing, emollient, and humectant ingredients, including mandelic acid, rosehip oil, green tea extract, and kiwi extract.
• Peptides encourage the skin to produce more of its own ultimate moisture factor, hyaluronic acid, and also reduce redness. Apply Rejuv Rx Gentle Peptide Serum for intense hydration and calming.
• Allantoin Sedating and Hydrating Lotion is packed with healing and hydrating properties. Natural, anti-inflammatory allantoin, plus grape seed oil, soothing oat protein, whole leaf aloe, and zinc peptides restore and revive dry, irritated, sensitive skin. 
• Use peptide-rich Wink Eye Rejuvenation Cream around the eye area. For a firming, hydrating boost, apply Rejuv Rx Peptide Serum underneath it.

 

Normal Skin

Your concerns are more with maintenance and prevention. Retain moisture, keep skin in balance, and stave off signs of aging with formulas that incorporate antioxidants, collagen promoters, and photoprotective elements along with hydration.

• Derm-A-Renew serum combines vitamin A with peptides and humectant lactic acid, scoring on all fronts: collagen promoter, hyaluronic acid booster, redness reducer, moisture attracter.
• Marine Skin Nourishing Cream is antioxidant- and nutrient-rich with bioactive marine minerals and proteins to improve elasticity and support natural firmness.
• Protect skin from age-accelerating UV exposure with Day Treatment Lotion SPF 15 in the morning.

Firm the eye area, protect from environmental stressors, and enhance elasticity with antioxidant- and peptide-rich Wink Eye Rejuvenation Cream.