Note: This article contains tips on how to make your skin glow and Season 6 Gossip Girl spoilers.
I often get asked what my favourite foundations and primers are for creating natural, glowy makeup and the answer to that is: good skin prep.
So I thought I would put together a list of some of my favourite products that are key to promoting glowing skin.
Now we all know glowing skin starts with a healthy diet full of leafy greens, broccoli, brussel sprouts and plenty of water. But sometimes our diets are pizza, red wine and 3 hours sleep. So to help pick up some of the slack we can enlist the help of these 5 products:
1. Chemical Exfoliants
If anyone has recommended that you should be exfoliating your face with any of the following products, they are not your friend they need to go directly in the bin:
- St Ives Scrub
- Exfoliating glove
- A mixture of PVA glue & charcoal powder
When it comes to exfoliating chemical exfoliants are where it is at. Chemical exfoliants work by dissolving the ‘glue’ that keeps skin cells together. This helps to shed dead skin cells, leaving behind new, fresh glowing skin. So even though they sound scary, they do a much nicer job of exfoliating than just straight up scratching your skin off, like an exfoliating glove would.
Some of my favourites include:
Skyn Iceland Nordic Peel
2. Vitamin C
Vitamin C is a bit of an all-rounder when it comes to healthy, glowing skin. First and foremost it is an antioxidant, so it helps to protect your skin from free radicals aka The Bad Guys. However, Vitamin C is not only a crime fighting genius, it also helps to plump the skin by promoting collagen production.
Oh you thought the resume ended there? Not a chance.
Vitamin C is also CEO of brightening the skin, reducing the appearance of pigmentation caused by sun damage and scarring caused by telling yourself you won’t pop that pimple, but doing it anyway.
Rubbing an orange onto your face will be a straight up bad time, so I would suggest trying one of these serums instead:
3. Face Oil
If you’re like me, you might have grown up getting your skincare education from Dolly magazines in the late 90’s/early 00’s. If so, you were probably told that face oils are evil and that matching velour tracksuits and trucker hats were the height of fashion.
Twenty years later, I am here to tell you that that is false.
Okay I lied, velour tracksuits are forever, but so are face oils.
Face oils are a great way to pump your skin full of hydration for plump, glowing skin. Not all oils are created equal, so make sure you are looking for oils that are packed full of vitamins, anti-oxidants and omegas (3,6 & 9) and avoid any that are heavily processed, full of petroleum or thinks that Dan Humphrey as Gossip Girl was an acceptable end to the series.
Favourites include but are definitely not limited to:
Drunk Elephant Marula Oil
4. Retinol
Retinol is your no. 1 best friend for fresh glowing skin. Retinol works by promoting collagen production and increasing cell turnover. This brings bright new skin cells to the surface, plumping fine lines and wrinkles.
Spoiler: Benjamin Button is actually just about a guy adding retinol into his skincare routine.
Before you run out and buy every single retinol product on the market, it is important to know that retinol comes in a variety of forms and strongest doesn’t always mean best. If you are new to the retinol party, I would suggest using a milder form of retinol like retinyl palmitate or plant based retinol Bakuchiol and introducing it into your routine slowly.
Some of my favourites include:
Sunday Riley Luna Oil
5. Sunscreen
This is non-negotiable. Removing the top layer of dead skin with chemical exfoliants and retinoids will increase your skin’s sensitivity to the sun. Which to put it simply is: not good.
There’s a ton of superficial reasons why increased sensitivity to the sun is bad, like:
- Wrinkles
- Accelerated aging
- Pigmentation
- Sun spots
But there are also less superficial reasons, like: skin cancer.
In Australia, we live approximately 4.5km from the sun, and currently have very scary skin stats like ‘2 in 3 Australians will develop skin cancer by the time they are 70’ (Cancer Council, 2020). So wear the damn sunscreen.
Traditionally sunscreen is thick and gluggy and feels super gross, so I understand why people avoid it. But luckily we live in 2020 and there are some super clever chickens out there that have developed sunscreens that feel soft and silky and nice. My favourites include any and every sunscreen in the Mecca Cosmetica To Save Face collection or if I want a hint of colour the Lira SPF Solar Shield 30 Classic Tint.
Mecca Cosmetica To Save Face
If at the end of this you are like okay this all sounds great, but I am inconsistent at best with my skincare routine- please for the love of dogs wear sunscreen.
Cream highlighter can still work to make you a glowy babe, but it will do nothing to help prevent skin cancer.
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