Make dry patches nonexistent this season with these five winter skin care hacks!
Winter weather means gift giving, hot chocolate, and cold weather accessories. But even with all those warm, fuzzy events, winter also brings along a Scrooge or two, which may come in the form of dryness, flaky patches, and persistently chapped lips.
If you’re like me and feel like the winter weather and the constant central heat is sucking the life out of your skin, you’re most definitely not alone. Once the temperatures start to drop, it’s important to be more diligent about your skin care routine so you can protect your skin from these unfortunate environmental stressors.
To help you stay glowing all winter long, we’ve compiled a list of five different winter skin care hacks to keep those pesky dry patches at bay.
Spike Your Moisturizer with A Touch of Oil
As the winds cut against your face and your body readjusts to overdone heating, your skin goes through such extremes on a daily basis that it’s no wonder it can end up chapped, flaking, and peeling. It’s at this time that your moisturizer is really put to the test to see if it can stand up against all that winter throws your way.
Unfortunately, more often than not (especially in the bitterly cold NYC), you find out that no matter how much you moisturize, it’s just not cutting it. This is where oils come in to save the day. Adding a few drops of oil to your moisturizer will provide extra nourishment and healing that your moisturizer is missing out on.
Some of our favorite oils are the Erborian Dongbaek Camellia Seed Oil and the RE:P Nutrinature Ultra Moist Gel Oil. The Erborian oil is enriched with 73% of camellia oil, also known as the “rose of winter” since it can thrive even in cold environments. This oil is also packed with four other oils: macadamia seed, argan, sunflower, and grape. These work together to deeply nourish your skin while preventing premature signs of aging like fine lines and wrinkles. It could be the extra boost your moisturize is craving.
The RE:P Nutrinature Ultra Moist Gel Oil is a unique formula that moisturizes like an oil but has the texture of a serum, making it a perfect addition for those who don’t like overly greasy finishes. It’s packed with argan oil, jojoba seed, and shea butter to moisturize and fortify your skin’s natural barrier by effectively protecting it from winter stressors. Just add a drop or two to your moisturizer to bump up its ability to smooth and calm your skin.
Mask As Much as You Can
This hack should be a no brainer, but for those who haven’t yet taken the plunge and tried out a sheet mask, it’s time! Sheet masks are designed to to force feed your skin as much moisture and nourishment as possible in 20 minutes or less and they become especially important in the winter when our skin is craving that extra moisture.
If you need moisture pronto, the Leaders Moisturizing Recovery Mask would work since it’s formulated with peptides and amino acids to help create a barrier on the skin to seal in hydration for good.
The Acwell Traditional Grain Syrup Ginger Mask is also a great one to help seal in moisture while bringing back elasticity. These masks are inspired by traditional Korean herbal medicine and are packed with fermented grain syrup, ginger, and mistletoe extracts to deliver rich nutrition to skin. The syrup-like essence helps your skin drink up all the goodness without leaving a greasy residue behind.
Sheet masks aren’t your only option when it comes to masking. In fact, it’s a great idea to use a combination of sheet masks and sleeping masks to really pump the skin with moisture. The Lioele V-Line Sleeping Pack is a nightly mask that you can put on after your moisturizer or in place of it to nourish and soothe your skin while you sleep. The star ingredients are hyaluronic acid, glycerin, along with wolf’s bane and wormwood extract to calm redness and leave your skin feeling refreshed by the morning. Plus, unlike a lot of sleep masks, this one is lightweight so it’ll hydrate without any residue.
Mist Often
Face mists aren’t just for beating the summer heat! Misting often in the winter can help to keep your skin hydrated all day long, especially when you’re constantly moving from cold temperatures to the blasting indoor heat. I find this to be especially helpful mid-afternoon when I’m working. My skin tends to feel tight and dry so I whip out my mist and spritz away for instant hydration.
A lot of mists don’t live up to the hype of actually hydrating the skin so make sure to look for ingredients that will feed your skin’s natural barrier. These include ceramides, lipids, and humectants. The Goodal Moisture Barrier Mist is a definite game-changer in the mist world as it’s formulated to feed your skin barrier exactly what it craves. This comes in the form of milk lipids, shea butter, and aloe leaf juice, along with mistletoe berry extract, a plant known to flourish and withstand the coldest of temperatures. These ingredients help to bring back dewiness, fighting against dull skin.
Another great one is the Enature Birch Juice Hydro Mist which is packed with 91% birch tree sap along with chamomile and plantain seed extracts to intensely hydrate and nourish your complexion. A quick spritz of this mist and your skin should feel soft and radiant—as well as calm, since these ingredients also work to repair irritated and damaged skin.
Exfoliate Regularly
During the winter, the cooler temperatures cause our skin to get drier—and as a result—dead skin cells tend to build up quicker which can potentially lead to breakouts. This is why it’s important to exfoliate regularly in the winter to help keep those dead skin cells at bay and your pores clear from debris.
If you’re into physical exfoliation, then the Neogen Bio Peel Gauze Peeling in Green Tea is a great option since these exfoliating pads slough off dead skin cells using their unique three layer pad technology. The green tea ones contain, of course, green tea but also centella asiatica extract and tea tree leaf oil which work together to exfoliate the skin and calm breakouts. Green tea is also a powerful antioxidant that prevents premature aging so you can smooth your skin and reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles (which become more apparent when your skin is drier).
If you prefer chemical exfoliants, the My Skin Mentor Dr. G Brightening Peeling Cream is an excellent choice. This innovative product exfoliates your skin while you sleep! It contains an effective blend of AHAs, BHAs, and PHAs, which work in tandem to unclog pores and dissolve excess sebum and dead skin cells to reveal brighter more hydrated skin.
Invest in a Humidifier
The reason why our skin gets drier in the winter is because as the temperature drops, so does the humidity level, making not only your skin dry but the weather as well. This means that once it gets cooler, the water in your skin tends to evaporate quicker. As a result, you can end up with dry, flaky skin.
To make it even worse, not only does the cooler temperature suck the moisture from your skin but so does the indoor heat, which could leave your skin parched. To combat this, it’s worth it to invest in a humidifier, which are devices that work by emitting water vapor or steam, effectively increasing the moisture level in the air.
You definitely don’t need to break the bank when you buy one. Even smaller desktop ones, like this one, can help to soothe and hydrate the skin. They can also help to alleviate other winter related issues like a dry, stuffy nose and chapped lips so it will not only help your skin but your health as well.
Bottom line:
Even though winter is known for bringing along dry, patchy skin, it doesn’t have to be that way. If your skin is feeling rough and dull, try out one of these hacks to bring back life to your skin so you can stay glowing and dewy all winter long.
+ What are your favorite winter skin care hacks? Let us know in the comments below!
