Hello suntanned and glowing beauties! 👄🌞❤️
Look at you all beautifully shining with your skin radiant and healthy! Well my dears it’s elementary- that’s because you know all about moisturizing and protecting your beauty!
So as you know, a big part of having beautiful skin is by having a healthy “moisture barrier” and also preventing damage to the “moisture barrier”. But what exactly is the “moisture barrier” and what is its primary purpose?
We asked Dr. Costi to explain for us in more details, so that we can stay on top of our skin care game.
“The skin’s moisture barrier is exactly what it says: it helps the skin to retain moisture, specifically water” explains Dr. Costi. “It consists of the epidermis, which is actually made of five layers, of which the final layer called stratum corneum.”
And we were thinking that the epidermis was the skin’s outer layer! What’s more, here’s the kicker! As per Dr. Costi, the stratum corneum is a layer of actively shedding dead skin cells,” and this is fortified with links of cell-to-cell connections and the contents of your oil glands that contain lipids.
Therefore the barrier works to keep water sealed in, and keeps the skin looking smooth and dewy. At the same time, it protects from external aggressors and repels irritants.
To know if your skin’s moisture barrier is healthy, or whether it needs an extra helping hand, look at your skin:
Is it rough? Is it red or itchy? Does it look dull?
When water passes from the dermis through the epidermis and evaporates from the skin’s surface, this is known as transepidermal water loss. Circumstances such as injury, low-humidity weather conditions and some skin products that dry out the skin can impact TEWL.
Although this might also be hereditary (blame it on your mama!) there are a few things you could do to help yourself and maintain the desirable levels of TEWL.
Your skin needs both hydration and moisturization to maintain a low level of TEWL and a healthy skin moisture barrier.
“In order to achieve this we must combine both humectant and occlusive skincare ingredients” explains Dr. Costi.
Humectants help to draw moisture to the epidermis, then when this water content is drawn, you must stop it from being lost through TEWL, that’s why you use an occlusive on top. This occlusive on top will mimic the lipids of the stratum corneum.
Together, these ingredients create a reservoir of moisture in the epidermis and act as a barrier on the skin to help prevent TEWL by sealing in that moisture. The occlusive agents will also keep pollutants, toxins and harmful bacteria out. Result: you’re helping restore your natural skin’s barrier.
Dr. Costi’s extra tip: make sure your skin is perfectly clean before applying your products.
So an example of a healthy skin routine would be to: on perfectly clean skin, apply a good moisturizing cream with hyaluronic acid, then apply a good oil to seal in all that moisture. You might also want to check out slugging.
What do you think beauties? Is your skin Happy and hydrated? Thankfully if you need help, you can always ask our favorite dermatologist who is just a click away.
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