How to Rejuvenate Your Skin Post-Christmas

Christmas has been and gone, and what are we left with? Poor skin, less money and not a lot to look forward to! As we head into the winter months, we pay attention to changing our wardrobe, change our makeup and our nails, opting for darker tones or warmer colours. Some people dye their hair darker, and move back to blonder tones as the Summer creeps in.

But one thing that many people forget to alter in the winter months is their skincare routine.

Just like how you should alter your skincare in a heatwave, the colder months call for a winter skincare routine too. Now it’s important to note, you won’t need wildly different products or ingredients, but simply a subtle change in the way you care for your skin.

So what does your skin need in the winter? Take note, as here are our top winter skincare tips at Beauty Within Salon.

Signs You Need a Skincare Switch Up

Our skin acts as a constant barrier to the weather, and in the winter months, with the dry, cold air, our skin tends to become drier, rougher and potentially painful. Here are some signs and symptoms you need a winter skincare routine switch up.

• Rough texture and irritated

• Cracking

• Painful – stinging/burning

• Redness and feels ‘raw’

• Flakiness/scaliness

If you’re experiencing any of the above skin symptoms during winter, follow our guidance below on how to restore your skin to its best self.

1. Don’t overload the skin

When you experience the above symptoms, it can be tempting to completely ditch your entire skincare routine that you’ve sworn loyalty to all year, and start completely afresh with new products to target your current challenges and combat winter skin.

However, there is no need to completely overload the skin with such changes. Good skincare products, such as those we stock from Medik8, are suitable all year round and should help you transition through the seasons. If you’re going to incorporate new products, or remove others from your routine this winter, then ensure to do so slowly and make a transition over a few weeks.

2. Moisturise after washing

When we wash our hands, face or body, we remove the natural oils that working on and beneath the skin. The nature of these natural oils is to lock in moisture.

During the winter or rainy months, we often subconsciously wash more – to warm up after getting caught in the rain, to relax/unwind in the tub, to wash mud off our feet from a winter walk. With the drier, crisper air, it is harder to retain moisture as the air dries our skin out. We therefore recommend you moisturise after washing with the Medik8 Nourishing Body Cream, which a sumptuous body moisturiser, or try the Medik8 Ultimate Recovery Intense if you’ve got particularly dry skin.

3. Maintain a healthy lifestyle

One of the biggest impactors of unhealthy winter skin is lifestyle, which we often forget about. Our diet changes, often for the worse, and we tend to drink more with the rise in holiday and social occasions. We’re spending more time sat inside and less time being active outside. This all has an impact on our skin. Try to continue eating healthy foods, getting in a similar amount of fruits and vegetables as you did in the summer. Stay active and wrap up warm!

4. Try to limit extremes

When we’ve been freezing cold outside, we tend to come into a house that is nicely warmed by our central heating, sit with a cup of something hot or jump in a boiling hot shower. However, jumping between these extremes can affect our skin, drying it out and causing irritation. Try to warm up slowly, putting your shower on lukewarm and then turning it hotter if you need to.

5. Continue to use sunscreen

But isn’t sunscreen only needed when it’s sunny? Absolutely not. UVA rays are present, at the same strength, all day all year round and can penetrate through grey cloud cover. This is one of the biggest mistakes many of us make when it comes to seasonal skincare – removing SPF your winter skincare routine.

Continue to protect your skin, no matter the weather, with high-quality SPF that you can use alongside your other skincare products. We’d recommend opting for one that you can tie into your normal routine, such as the Medik8 Advanced Day Total Protect, which is SPF30, or the Medik8 Advanced Day Ultimate Protect, which is SPF50.

6. Stay hydrated – in these three key ways

Hydration is a key area you need to focus on throughout the winter months in order to maintain soft, smooth winter skin. As we already know, the cold air combined with hotter indoor temperatures and use of central heating can dry on the skin. Additional to this, we tend to drink less water in the winter due to not being as warm. Stay hydrated in three key ways:

• Hydrate your skin on the surface. Medik8’s Hydra8 B5 is their best-selling liquid rehydration serum, perfect for plumping your skin and helping it to retain water.

• Drink lots of water. Whether you swap your usual water bottle for a flask of mint tea, keep the liquids coming!

• Purchase a humidifier to help add moisture back into the air alongside your central heating.

7. Certain types of exfoliation

If your skin is looking dry or flaky in the winter months, exfoliation can help to remove the dead skin cells and smoothen your skin. However, ensure to use a gentle exfoliator rather than a harsh scrub. We’d recommend Medik8’s Pore Refining Scrub, which helps to cleanse out pores, decongest and tighten back to their original size.

This being said, if your skin is particularly raw or painful, use gentle cleansers and focus on healing.

Don’t neglect your skin this winter

We often see the efforts of summer skincare going to waste in the winter, with many of us falling into poor skincare routines, unhealthy diets and lower activity levels. We hope you found these steps to having a great winter skincare routine useful.