Travel Skin Care Tips for Jetsetters
Do you love to travel or find yourself traveling a lot for work?
Whether for work or for play, being able to get out and experience the world is such a treat!
Unfortunately, travel can also be hard on your skin. Adapting your skin care routine while you’re away from home can be helpful, but investing in travel-specific skin care products to give your skin exactly what it needs is an even better way to go.
How can travel impact your skin?
Travel may be good for the soul, but it can be hard on your skin.
But how can a simple plane ride wreak so much havoc? Dermatologists have been looking into this for years, and it generally comes down to one main factor: humidity.
The air in an airplane cabin is naturally a lot drier than the air on the ground.
A 2012 study showed that the relative humidity level of the average airplane cabin was between 10 to 40 percent. Meanwhile, the average humidity level in the home is usually between 30 to 60 percent.
Your skin needs humidity to thrive. When you spend too much time in a low-humidity environment, your skin can become less resilient.
Dry skin also tends to be more prone to breakouts and may appear dull and flat. Dryness can also contribute to sensitive skin, which is why supporting it with the right travel skin care products is so crucial.
The longer you spend in the air, the more impact the lack of humidity can have. Travel skin care is a good investment even if you only travel a few times a year — but it’s absolutely essential if you travel for a living or have a long trip planned.
Here are 4 of our favorite travel skin care tips!
1. KEEP UP THE HYDRATION.
If you already have dry skin, you know just how vital hydration is for keeping your complexion looking and functioning at its best. However, even those without a naturally dry skin type need moisture.
Moisture is more than just a nourishing agent; it’s also crucial for supporting your skin’s all-important moisture barrier, the stratum corneum.
The stratum corneum is the outermost layer of your epidermis, and it is the first line of defense for your entire body. When it’s healthy, it helps protect the skin from ultraviolet radiation from the sun, toxins, pollutants and other external influences.
When the moisture barrier is not healthy, those influences can easily slip through and cause damage. Depending on what you encounter, this damage may look like an increase in blemishes, sun damage from free radicals (in the form of fine lines, a loss of collagen and other signs of premature aging) or just a loss of radiance.
Choosing the right hydrating ingredients can make a huge difference. Hyaluronic acid is one common hydrating ingredient because it’s the same moisturizing fluid that’s already in your body.
Each hyaluronic acid molecule can carry 1,000 times its weight in water, which can help flood the skin with moisture. Once that moisture is inside the skin, hyaluronic acid can also hold it there, supporting that increased hydration level for longer.
Ceramides, also known as barrier lipids, are another rock star hydration ingredient. Lipids are a crucial component of the moisture barrier, so applying them topically can help strengthen it even further.
Niacinamide can also help keep the skin moisturized. While it doesn’t provide hydration, it can help prevent moisture from evaporating due to its occlusive properties. Plus, niacinamide can help soothe irritated skin, which can be extremely helpful after a long flight.
If you can, you may also want to invest in a humidifier. Even a travel-sized option that you can place on a bedside table can help give your skin the added humidity it needs to stay hydrated.
2. SKIP THE ABRASIVE FACIAL CLEANSERS.
After traveling, your skin might be more vulnerable than usual.
It may be tempting to jump right back into using your normal skin care routine, but we’d recommend holding off on abrasive cleansers (especially those with powerful exfoliators like retinol and salicylic acid) for at least a few days. This can help give your skin the time it needs to rest and heal.
You don’t want to skip your cleanser entirely, though. Travel can also subject your skin to a wide range of environmental factors, like pollutants and debris.
Removing these from your face before they can penetrate your moisture barrier can help protect your skin. To do this, try starting with a gentle, fragrance-free makeup remover and face wash to allow your skin to bounce back before transitioning to your pre-travel routine.
When washing your skin, make sure only to use lukewarm water. Hot water can feel great temporarily, but it can also break down and strip natural oils and lipids from the skin.
When your skin is already vulnerable, it needs all the protection it can get. It can also help to invest in a microfiber facial towel to dry your skin. When you dry your face, make sure to use blotting instead of rubbing motions.
3. MOISTURIZER IS YOUR BEST FRIEND.
After you’ve cleansed your skin (using a gentle and non-abrasive cleanser), your next step should be to use a supportive, ultra-hydrating moisturizer. We’ve combined the two in our Jetsetter Kit, which has TSA-approved, travel-size versions of our Foaming Cleanser and Recovery Lotion.
Our Recovery Lotion is an excellent post-travel face moisturizer because it can deliver oxygen and hydration directly to your skin cells. With an ingredient list that features hyaluronic acid and barrier lipids, it’s made to soothe stressed-out, post-travel skin.
We also recommend our Recovery Lotion after certain skin care treatments because it can support recovering skin in need of extra moisture.
Don’t forget to moisturize other parts of your body, too! It’s not just your face that needs extra hydration when you travel.
Use eye cream, lip balm and body lotion to give hydration to all the places that need it — like the puffy dark circles that can come with jet lag. You may even want to use hydrating hair care products. After all, your hair needs just as much moisture as your skin does to look and feel its best.
Another way to support your skin when you travel (as well as when you get back home) is by using facial masks. Whether you prefer sheet masks, eye masks or clay masks, these beauty products can give your skin even more concentrated, targeted attention. The key is to listen to what your skin needs.
4. DON’T SKIP THE SUNSCREEN.
An appropriate travel skin care routine doesn’t stop with your cleanser. Sunscreen also belongs on your list of travel essentials — before, during and after your trip.
The skin is always at risk of damage from the sun’s ultraviolet radiation. However, when your skin is at its most vulnerable, using sunscreen is even more vital.
Your skin isn’t capable of fully protecting itself against UV radiation, so you’ll need to take additional steps to make sure it stays safe. Slip a travel-friendly bottle of SPF 30 sunscreen into your carry-on bag, and continue to use it after you get back home.
Sunscreen is one of the best ways to protect your skin and help it look youthful and radiant for as long as possible. We strongly urge you to use sunscreen even on the days you won’t be spending time outdoors.
You can also combine sunscreen with an antioxidant-rich vitamin C serum for additional protection and hydration, as well as help with brightening an uneven skin tone and dark spots.
The bottom line...
As amazing as travel is, your skin oftentimes can pay the price. Supporting your skin with the right travel skin care products can help reduce the toll travel takes on your skin.
But don’t worry; plenty of travel-size skin care sets — like our Jetsetter Kit — offer top-notch support without getting you in trouble with TSA.
SOURCES:
Ambient humidity and the skin: the impact of air humidity in healthy and diseased states | PubMed
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