Get winter-ready with fluffy sweaters, a cup of hot cocoa, and a new skincare game. Winter is about to soak up all your moisture and leave you with dry, duller-than-ever skin. With the weather changing and temperatures dropping, your skin is going to feel flaky and scaly if you’re not taking precautions. Cold air, low humidity levels, and severe winter winds can all suck the moisture out of your skin. Making your skin look scaly and parched. It’s easy to think to just slather on some moisturizer and call it a day, but you could be making your skin dehydrated by doing so. Especially as your skin ages, lack of natural moisture can deprive you of your skin’s natural sheen and protective barrier.
Creams and oils are generally composed of fats that form a protective barrier on the skin and keep moisture from leaving its deeper layers. Using these creams is useless if your skin is drier than the Sahara Desert.
If you want the healthiest winter skin to reduce redness and boost suppleness, change out your skincare game with a few easy steps.
Weekly sheet masks
Sheet masks are an amazing way to boost hydration to dry and parched skin. A sheet mask with hydrating ingredients will saturate your face with moisture-boosting active ingredients. The serum infused in the mask will revitalize your dry, parched skin to feel plump and firm instantly. The serum will intensely hydrate your skin, restoring any lost radiance. The key ingredient is hyaluronic acid, known to hold 1000 times its molecular weight in water to retain moisture to make your skin healthier and supple like a baby’s bum.
Double Cleanse
Stay far away from harsh scrubs and drying soaps. If you want to remove dirt and makeup gently, a cleansing balm can remove waterproof makeup and sunscreen without stripping natural oils and irritating your skin. Follow up your cleansing balm with a gentle cleanser to remove the balm’s residue. Avoid cleansers with drying ingredients with additives and stripping agents, instead opt for soothing chamomile or oatmeal cleansers that protect the skin’s moisture content. For acne-prone skin, treat it with salicylic acid and benzoyl peroxide gently since these can exacerbate dry skin.
Exfoliate
Your biggest enemy is dead skin cell build causing flaky, parched scaly skin. Without some gentle exfoliation, the skin will continue to stay dry no matter how many serums and lotions you slather on. Exfoliating your skin regularly even during winter is important for a glowing complexion. It helps smooth and polishing of your skin, reducing the appearance of fine lines, and wrinkles and stimulating collagen production. Exfoliation exposes a new layer of skin that’s ready to lock in moisture when hydrating products are applied. Chemical exfoliating includes using AHA or BHA, alpha hydroxy acids such as glycolic, lactic, tartaric, and citric acids, or beta hydroxy acids such as salicylic acid.
Antioxidant Serum
Pump up the moisture with a face serum. With its high concentration of chemicals, it helps to boost hydration, brighten your face and reduce signs of aging. Vitamin C serum has a skin-brightening benefit but also helps to retain moisture. Using it with an emollient such as Vitamin E will help the skin effectiveness to maintain the skin’s moisture. Antioxidants can help prevent and repair free radical damage to collagen.
Face Cream
Your moisturizer is probably the most overlooked skincare step. Changing to a rich moisturizer is one of the most critical and sometimes ignored moves in the dry skin game. A cream instead of a lotion is infused with protective ingredients such as hyaluronic acid and ceramides that can restore the skin's barrier and provide 24-hour hydration. A gel formula has long-wearing hydration properties that instantly absorb into the skin without leaving behind a greasy or heavy residue.
Keep up with a skincare game that’s foolproof against winter weather to prevent flaky skin. To make your life a little easier, keep an eye out for a few winter-friendly ingredients such as ceramides, hyaluronic acid, niacinamide, and botanical oils that are known to restore hydration.
