In one of our articles, Skincare Basics: What You May Not Know About Cleansing, we briefly touched on a cleansing scrub or exfoliation. We’ve decided to zero in on exfoliation, so here it is – Exfoliation 101 – the basics to exfoliation in a skincare regime.
What is exfoliation?
Because of metabolism, dead skin cells are shed every day. Exfoliation is the removal the layer of dead skin cells that build up on the surface of your skin.
Why do I need to exfoliate?
Dead skin cells may clog your pores, causing blackheads that would eventually lead to pimples. The layer, if it becomes thicker, also makes your complexion looks dull, and prevents skincare products from penetrating into your skin. (Now you know why your expensive serum isn’t working!)
Removing them would mean you’re preventing clogging, and allowing new skin cells that are hidden under that layer to be revealed, giving you the appearance of radiant skin. Furthermore, exfoliating the skin will allow the products you apply work better because it has the opportunity to seep through your skin and work its magic.
How often do I need to exfoliate?
This depends on your skin type and the type of exfoliator you use. If you have dry, sensitive skin, it is recommended for you to exfoliate once a week. This is to ensure that your skin will not end up becoming drier. Exfoliating should be beneficial, so you wouldn’t want it to end up being the cause of more breakouts and even drier skin! For those with oily or normal skin, you can exfoliate up to two times a week.
There are different types of exfoliators in the market. There are normal facial scrubs like the ones we mentioned in our article, exfoliators that are coarser to ensure that you scrub out ALL the gunk from your face and there are also electronic devices like the Clarisonic.
How do I exfoliate?
1. Gentle Facial Scrubs
These types of exfoliators are the easiest to use and find, and they are affordable too. You can get a decent facial scrub at an affordable price. With facial scrubs, all you have to do is just use it the way you would a regular cleanser, but spend more time gently rubbing the product onto your skin. Facial scrubs have microbeads in them and it is these microbeads that do the exfoliating for you. An affordable one would be the St Ives Apricot Facial Scrub, featured in our Skincare Basics article.
2. Coarse Facial Scrubs
An example of such facial scrubs or exfoliators is like LUSH’s Dark Angels. It is made out of charcoal, rhassoul mud and other natural ingredients that help to exfoliate the skin. With this product, you also have the ability to make it as coarse or as gentle as you want by adjusting the amount of water you use to make the product into a paste. The less water you use, the thicker the consistency will be and the more friction it will have to scrub out the dead skin cells from your skin.
The product is black; so you will look like you’ve been working hard in a mine or something after you’re done exfoliating your face. The key to using these types of facial scrubs is to make sure you don’t overscrub. You know your skin best. If it’s too coarse for you, add more water and rub it gently on your skin in circular motions, concentrating on the areas you get oiliest most, and where you get the most breakouts.
3. Clarisonic and other electronic cleansing devices
The Clarisonic is one of the most highly raved about product in the beauty community. So many beauty gurus and makeup artists swear by it for its ability to deep cleanse the skin. Lucky for you, we’ve previously reviewed Clarisonic. Not only does the Clarisonic offer different speeds (From the Mia 2 model onwards), they also have different brushes you can buy, like the exfoliating one to exfoliate your skin with. The downside of the Clarisonic and other electronic face cleansing devices is that it is pricey and there is a need for you to replace the brush heads after a few months.
We hope that you now know understand the importance of exfoliating your skin and will add it into your skincare routine!
