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Every single process that occurs in your skin requires moisture, meaning that a lack of moisture will quickly start to affect your complexion. Even just a small amount of dehydration will leave your skin looking dull and sallow, with any creases becoming more noticeable. On the other hand, keep your skin fully hydrated and it will soon take on a plump, smooth, and dewy appearance.
The problem is that skin hydration levels can be difficult to maintain. Sure, you may slather your face with your arsenal of hydrating skincare products in the morning but by afternoon, a large amount of that moisture will have already evaporated away.
So, what’s the secret to keeping your skin hydrated all day long? Here are 10 top tips from VouPre:
1) Fully Cleanse Before Applying Skincare Products
Your morning skincare routine will have a huge impact on how hydrated your skin feels throughout the day. However, before you turn to those super-hydrating skincare products, you need to make sure that your skin has been thoroughly cleansed. If you allow any impurities to remain on your skin, the hydrating ingredients that you apply will struggle to reach your skin cells, rendering them ineffective.
With that said, you don’t want to over-cleanse either. This will only irritate your skin and leave it feeling less receptive to the products that you subsequently apply. So, use a gentle cleanser – ideally one that can provide a little hydration of its own too! The VouPre Radiance Facial Cleanser, which boasts hydrolyzed wheat protein – a great humectant – would be a good choice. It’s also infused with vitamin E, which will leave your skin feeling stronger and softer.
2) Be Gentle When Exfoliating in the Mornings
If cleansing helps to clear the way for your skincare products to access your skin cells, exfoliating does this to an even greater extent. Since exfoliators work on a deeper level than cleansers, exfoliating is even better for encouraging your hydrating products to work to their full potential.
However, go overboard with your exfoliation efforts and you could end up removing part of your skin’s protective barrier. This barrier is responsible for keeping moisture trapped in and, therefore, keeping the skin hydrated. If you’re aiming for maximum hydration, this barrier needs to be as intact as possible.
If you decide to exfoliate in the morning, use a gentle exfoliator, like the VouPre Deep Renewal Facial Peel. Make sure that you’re extra vigilant about sun protection afterward. Exfoliation can leave your skin temporarily more vulnerable to sun damage, which, as you’ll find out soon, also affects skin hydration levels.
3) Layer Topical Hydration
While many skincare products claim to be the only product you need to keep your skin hydrated, this is very rarely true. Incorporating just a single hydrating product into your skincare routine will hydrate for a while but won’t provide long-lasting moisture.
Instead, if you want to ensure hydration all day long, you’ll need to layer a few hydrating skincare products onto your skin. Each new layer will push the previous one into your skin, preventing those hydrating ingredients from moisturizing.
What sort of hydrating products should you be layering? Toners, essences, and serums are great for this. Look for formulas that contain plenty of humectants, which are super-hydrating ingredients with moisture-binding properties. The String Lift Sculpting System, for example, contains a serum that offers six different forms of hyaluronic acid – one of the best hydrating humectants around! It combines these with even more humectants, including glycerin and peptides, resulting in an exceptionally hydrating blend.
4) Create a Moisture Barrier
As we mentioned earlier, the skin’s natural protective barrier is responsible for keeping moisture trapped in. It prevents this moisture from evaporating into the air around it.
However, for various reasons, the skin barrier doesn’t always function as efficiently as it should. It can sometimes benefit from some extra help. How can you provide this? By creating a moisture barrier of your own.
Layering hydrating skincare products will have you off to a good start. However, you should then ideally slather a rich moisturizer over the top. Not only will this seal in all of the hydrating products that you’ve already applied, but it will form an additional physical barrier over your skin’s natural one. With a cocktail of hydrating and moisturizing plant oils, as well as an infusion of peptides and antioxidants, the Aqua Nano Cream from the VouPre Aqua Collection does this beautifully!
One extra tip: apply your moisturizer while your skin is still damp from your previous products. This ensures that you’ll be locking in as many of those hydrating ingredients as possible!
5) Drink (and Eat) Plenty of Water
It goes without saying that drinking plenty of water is key to hydration. After all, water is what hydrates your entire body, and your skin is your body’s largest organ. Ideally, you should be drinking at least eight glasses of water a day. Any less than this and your body, as well as your skin, will struggle to stay sufficiently hydrated.
Of course, don’t forget that plenty of foods contain high levels of water too. Incorporating more of these into your diet will help even more with hydration levels. Cucumbers, watermelons, tomatoes, lettuce, and zucchini are great foods to start with!
6) Protect Your Skin From the Dehydrating Effects of the Sun
You’re probably already aware of some of the effects that UV rays can have on the skin. Wrinkles, dark spots, skin cancer…these issues are all widely discussed.
However, did you know that the sun can also dehydrate your skin? The more exposure to UV rays your skin has, the more of its moisture content it will lose. The sun will also damage your skin’s natural protective barrier. This will inhibit its ability to keep moisture locked into your skin.
If you want your skin to feel hydrated for hours, keeping it protected from the sun is a must. For double the benefits, find yourself an SPF product that also helps with hydration, just like the VouPre Age Defense Cream SPF 30. Not only does it function as a sunscreen but it also provides a plethora of hydrating and moisturizing ingredients, along with antioxidants.
7) Apply a Hydrating Overnight Face Mask
While it may seem as though your morning skincare routine is all that matters in terms of keeping your skin hydrated all day, your evening skincare routine will influence this too. After all, if you wake up with hydrated skin in the morning, it will then be much easier for you to keep your skin hydrated for the rest of the day.
In addition to including plenty of hydrating products in your evening skincare routine, using a hydrating overnight face mask is a great way to bump up your skin’s hydration levels even more. These no-rinse masks can then spend hours sinking into your skin. This ensures that you’re greeted with a dewy glow in the morning.
Don’t have a hydrating overnight mask? Check out the VouPre Aqua Melting Mask. With sodium hyaluronate, collagen, squalane, glycerin, and peptides, it offers up some of the best hydrating ingredients around!
8) Refresh With a Hydrating Face Mist or Toner
What should you do if your skin starts to feel dehydrated before the day is over?
One way to instantly refresh your complexion while providing some extra hydration is with a hydrating face mist or toner. Again, look for one that’s loaded with ingredients – water on its own will only evaporate away in no time. On the other hand, a product like the Collagen Plumping Mist, which can be found in the Collagen Cooling Set Limited Edition, is full of moisture-binding ingredients. Between sodium hyaluronate, glycerin, and collagen, your skin will instantly look dewier. Plus, with niacinamide and centella asiatica extract, it will also leave your skin tone with a brighter and more even finish.
9) Use a Humidifier When Spending Time Indoors
Do you spend a large amount of time indoors during the day? If this means that you’re constantly surrounded by air conditioning or artificial heating, this isn’t going to help you to keep your skin dehydrated.
Both air conditioning and heating systems severely dry out the air. Dry air increases transepidermal water loss, which is when your skin loses moisture to evaporation. While the tips that we’ve shared above will help you to counter that, using a humidifier is another effective way to keep your skin hydrated. By adding moisture back into the air, your skin won’t lose its own moisture at such a fast rate.
Ideally, keep your humidifier in the room in which you spend the most time, whether this may be your bedroom, office, kitchen, or anywhere else.
10) Cut Back on Coffee, Alcohol, and Nicotine
Already following all of the above tips but still struggling to keep your skin hydrated?
This could be down to some of your lifestyle habits. If you like to indulge in coffee, alcohol, and nicotine, do so with the awareness that all three are known for dehydrating the skin.
While the occasional cup of coffee or glass of wine isn’t going to dehydrate your skin too seriously, making these a regular part of your life will. If you still decide to head out for a night on the town, make an effort to match your alcohol intake with water. Not only will this slow you down but it will also help to keep your body and skin hydrated, both that night as well as the next day.
Summary
When looking into ways in which you can improve your skin’s hydration levels, it’s important to consider all angles. Not only should you be adjusting your skincare routine to include the right hydrating ingredients and products but you also need to ensure that you’re not unintentionally dehydrating your skin at the same time, whether this may be due to lifestyle habits, the sun, or anything else. By taking control of both, you’ll be able to enjoy skin that feels deeply hydrated while also looking brighter, softer, and infinitely healthier.
Click here to check out more hydrating bestsellers from VouPre.
