It’s great to be back on the blog with more beauty/skin content! So here’s my tea:

Cleansing balms, cleansers:

I think there’s really no need to be buying cleansers that are more than $20 and ones with a whole ton of ingredients to justify price, etc. Cleansers are literally on your face for less than a minute and you are washing your expensive ingredients and money down the drain. So spending your money towards serums with specific ingredients of interest that have it at higher concentrations and will sit on your skin overnight is more worth it IMO. Fitting my criteria, I recommend CeraVe and La Roche-Posay cleansers and banila co’s cleansing balm.

Toners, eye creams:

Not necessary whatsoever. Traditionally, toners are supposed to balance pH, remove oils and dirt from your face. Um… isn’t that what double cleansing is for? Plus, we often use serums, essences, solutions that drastically change our face’s pH (ie., glycolic acid, BHA, AHA, PHA, Vitamin C) so what’s the point. Eye creams are a waste of money as well. They are often super expensive which all these ingredients in a small little jar. You are better off buying serums and a better moisturizer with that money. Many dermatologists even agree. My face is combo oily, so I often just use a thicker moisturizer for under eyes vs the rest of my face.

Multistep routines:

Do not fall into the overconsumption marketing ploy that putting more on your face means better skin. “Ten step Korean skincare routine”, etcetc. For those that don’t really care much about skincare, even dermatologists say if anything use sunscreen. Yes, yup, mhm. But for those that actually want to do more, a cleanser, serum, moisturizer, and sunscreen is usually what only need. Which brings me to my next point:

Too many ingredients:

Do not fall into the psychology that more ingredients in a product means its better for your skin/ worth the price. A lot of these “extracts”, etcetc are in super low quantities and are just a marketing ploy to say they have xyz in this product. And more ingredients on your face just means its more likely to get irritation, an allergic reaction, or unwanted ingredient interactions.

Formula> Brand:

I can’t stress how important it is to read ingredients list, not just for food but for skin products as well. Higher end brands and products doesn’t mean better skin. There are many cost effective brands that have mostly the same ingredients of higher end products. So focus on the ingredients and formula. If you ever see me recommend expensive things, its because I can’t find a cheaper option with that texture, etc. So if anyone has a texture/formula dupe for Fresh’s Rose deep hydration cream, pleeeeeeeease tell me and save my wallet.

Aaaaand thats all my tea for now. If you have any tea to spill or skincare thoughts please share cuz there’s not many people I can talk about all this with 🥺