Serums, scrubs, masks, patches, creams, fluids and so on are advertised everywhere. But what do you really need? Our beauty expert Rolf Stehr gives you an overview and reveals what the basic must-haves are for flawless skin. A quick guide to your grooming routine.

Consistent daily facial care is the basis for beautiful, healthy skin. Our skin is a protective and metabolic organ that works day and night. For this reason alone, it’s important to cleanse twice a day and give your skin the nutrients it needs to function. This is comparable to the food intake that our body requires.

Therefore, get used to a care ritual in the morning and evening that you carry out as a matter of course and that you – like brushing your teeth – no longer want to do without.

Clean properly

The cleansing ritual forms the basis of your beauty program. Your skin can only really absorb new moisture and nourishing active ingredients if you remove the excreted toxins on your skin every morning by cleaning it. When young, use cleansing products for combination to oily skin.

If you are a bit older, you should switch to cleaning products that do not dry out your skin’s moisture layer. Sebum is also secreted overnight. If you do not remove this in the morning with fat-soluble cleansing products, the sebum on your skin or in the pores will oxidize. This causes blackheads (comedones).

If you like to put on makeup during the day , you should clean your face twice. The first step dissolves the dyes on your skin, and the second step cleanses the skin deep into the pores.

Use toner and toner

Many ask themselves: Do we really need a toner after cleaning? I definitely say yes! Because the facial toner or toner restores the natural pH value of your skin after cleaning. If you moisturize your dry skin again first, you increase the absorption of the follow-up products.

Good to know: A toner or tonic with a minimal amount of alcohol even improves the absorption capacity of your top layer of skin, while high alcohol levels dry out the skin even more.

Maintain with serum

After the facial tonic, the serum is applied sparingly to the entire face. The selection of serums is huge. Whether cleansing serum, vitamin serum, moisturizing serum or anti-aging serum: a serum has a higher concentration of active ingredients than creams. You can omit the serum if you don’t have any special skin needs. If you do, a serum as additional care will get you there faster.

creams for protection

When it comes to protection and care, there are many products available to you, just like with the serum. For example face creams, eye creams, neck and décolleté creams, BB creams , sunscreen creams .

Your cream primarily serves to maintain and build up the so-called hydrolipid barrier. This barrier serves to ensure that the skin does not lose as much moisture and at the same time no foreign substances – such as negative microorganisms – can penetrate your skin.

Depending on the skin type and sensitivity, there are a wide variety of formulations. Creams can be fluid or very oily emulsions. In addition to a high moisture content, creams should also have antioxidants. These protect the skin from negative environmental influences and ensure that skin aging is delayed. By the way: Screen radiation is bad for your skin and makes it age faster.

Extra care for the eye area

The skin around your eyes is particularly sensitive. With the right care, you can prevent wrinkles around the eyes early on – even if you don’t see any visible signs of aging at the moment. The reason: We do not have any subcutaneous fatty tissue in the area around our eyes. This tissue therefore collapses more quickly because the so-called supporting tissue is missing here. The rule here is: prevention is better than repair!

Additional care: the basis has to be right

With the five basic steps mentioned above, you can take good care of your skin in the morning and in the evening. Depending on your needs, you can also use other helpers. Perhaps you are looking for a quick freshener for on the go, anti-pimple care, an effective peeling or an anti-wrinkle booster. The range of cosmetic products is huge and leaves almost nothing to be desired. However, care products for special needs are usually expensive. All these additional products cannot work as they should if you do not create the optimal basis for them with the steps described.

Here, too, you can draw a comparison with general nutrition: Everything you do for your skin in addition to basic care is like a nutritional supplement: It covers special needs or deficiencies, but cannot replace a healthy diet.