How Your Environment Affects Your Skin

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In the winter, the role your environment plays on your skin is obvious. The combination of cold temps outside and warm air inside often creates dry, itchy, irritated skin. Let’s go beyond climate and season, though, and expand to all external factors that can affect your skin. These include: public spaces, chemicals, or minerals in household products, and even your pets. Here are four common environmental factors to be aware of and how to monitor them for skin health: Stay away from sensitizing ingredients, which include fragrances, parabens, and dyes. I urge you avoid these not only in skin-care products, but also in makeup, hair care, and laundry detergent. Once you remove sensitive ingredients from your environment, you might find you don’t have sensitive skin, but rather sensitized skin from external factors. It’s likely you touch public hand rails and door knobs, or maybe you have a pet that goes inside and outside ...

Common Skin Care Mistakes & How To Avoid Them

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Are you looking for shortcuts and simple solutions for everything from shopping, to exercise, to your skin-care routine? A time- and money-saving gift for you: when it comes to skin care, less is more. That advice, plus four more tips to help avoid common skin-care mistakes you may not even realize you are making: Not cleansing before bed. With work and hectic home life, there are likely to be many nights where you’d much rather fall into bed than take a few minutes to cleanse your skin. Sweat, oil, and dirt sit on your skin all day, so even if you don’t wear make-up, you still need to cleanse. My favorite is Daily Cleanser, a clear gel formula that gently cleanses and balances skin, leaving it feeling clean and smooth.An evening skin-care routine also is your time to address any concerns and/or maintain your current skin health. Before going to bed, I recommend ...

Hot Beauty and Fitness Trends in 2016

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On my Beauty Bootcamp segment on Fox5 San Diego, I shared the hot trends in beauty & fitness for 2016: Uber-ization of Beauty and Spa Services. We are a busy society, and are seeking alternative ways to maximize the amount of beauty services within our busy schedules. On-demand services such as Glamsquad, Zeel and My Skin Authority are examples of beauty and spa services that come to you. Serious Wellness for Children and Families Childhood obesity is out of control in the United States and is tied to the extreme amount of stress and pressure children are experiencing. The trend is wellness-focused family vacations, mindfulness sessions in school, family yoga and healthy eating classes.   Clean Beauty The same ingredients in organic, clean food are translating to skincare and cosmetics. In the near future, you will see kale, quinoa and tumeric in beauty ingredients. Intensive Fitness Workout enthusiasts are stepping up their game by increasing their levels of exercise. The ...

Creating a Home Spa Experience

Ahhh... the Season of Love is upon us! I feel like playing cupid and sharing some ideas on creating the right mood for Valentine’s. There's no question that the right spa experiences can be very romantic - the serene atmosphere, the aromas, the candles, the healing touch. Whether you are going for the day to unwind, or for a week to reconnect, spas provide a very sensory experience. So why not create a spa environment at home? Whether you indulge yourself or share it with a partner, you can achieve a wonderful result. I think it all starts with healthy eating. If you are eating properly, you will feel better about yourself. The inhibitions will come down and your mood will be elevated. Now that we're eating healthy, let's have some fun and create a spa experience at home. Start by outfitting your bedroom and bathroom with some luxurious linens and towels. ...

Ask the Expert: What Order Should I Apply Skin Care Products?

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It’s likely you have a specific process for applying makeup (primer first, lips last) and hair-care products. So, do you have an order with your skin-care regimen? If not, or if you simply need a refresher, layering is the word. Similar to the way you layer clothing, layering skin-care products is pretty straightforward: thinnest to thickest. The basic order is serum before lotion before cream. There are two areas that may not be quite as intuitive: SPF and oils. In the morning, you want SPF to be the last product applied before makeup. This stands true even if you are applying oil; pat the oil into skin and then apply SPF on top. At night, you want your oil to be the last product in your routine. Oils help seal in moisture and keep the water in creams from evaporating. While I’m on the subject of products: I’m often asked how many are needed for ...

Protect Your Winter Skin

As the temperature keeps dropping, you may be bundled up nicely against the cold; but are you sun protected? No matter how many layers we wear, one part of the body – the head and neck area – tends to remain exposed to the sun’s damaging ultraviolet (UV) radiation year-round. Not coincidentally, the face, head and neck are where the majority of skin cancers occur. So follow our winter sun safety guide and put your best face forward! Many people apply moisturizer to delicate facial skin to minimize windburn and chapping. However, long-term signs of aging like wrinkles don’t come from the wind or cold, but from the sun’s UV radiation. A sunscreen with a sun protection factor (SPF, which measures defense against the sun’s UVB rays) of 15+ helps keep skin supple and protected. The Skin Cancer Foundation recommends sunscreens that also have some combination of these UVA-protective ingredients: avobenzone, ecamsule, oxybenzone, titanium dioxide, ...

Dry and Dehydrated Skin Causes and Solutions

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Dry and Dehydrated Skin Are the harsh winter conditions leaving your skin dry and dehydrated? Can’t put enough moisturizer on your skin, but still feel no relief? Watch this video for long-term hi-tech solutions to bring your dry skin back to normal. Cleanse your face on a daily basis – morning and night. Choose a cleanser with a low pH and gentle alpha hydroxy acids (AHAs), which are antibacterial and remove dead skin cells from the surface. Unfortunately, most drugstore cleansers have a pH that is too high, which will leave your skin feeling dry and chapped. Some skin care lines try to compensate for the high pH and recommend a toner to lower pH. Most toners use an astringent, which also dries out your skin leaving it feeling dry and stripped of moisture. With a proper cleanser, you can clean your face without leaving it dry and unbalanced.  Daily Cleanser is my favorite. Resurface the skin ...

Research Backs Up Why You Should Swear Off Sugar

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The dangers of eating too much sugar go way beyond the negative effects on your waistline and health. It is a quick (and permanent) path to advanced skin aging. In my speaking engagements across the country, I often receive the attention of everyone in the room when sharing theWorld Health Organization targets hidden sugar as the #1 health issue globally.  WHO has been strongly advocating that adults and children reduce their daily intake of free sugars to less than 10% of their total energy intake.  Because the link between sugar intake and obesity is reaching new heights in the U. S., the government finally released new guidelines advocating the dangers of high intake of processed sugar products, simple carbohydrates (think bagels, energy bars) and artificial sweeteners (think fat free is not free!). WHO evidence shows: Adults who consume less sugar have lower body weight. Increasing the amount of sugars in the diet is associated with a weight increase. Children with the highest intakes ...

What is in your SPF?

You constantly hear from skin care experts that you should be covering yourself in SPF everyday. The only problem is not all SPFs are created equal. We have been receiving a lot of calls to our Skin Coaches with confusion about how to know what kind of sun protection to use. Does a higher number SPF mean better protection? What are UVA and UVB rays? What does it mean to be broad spectrum? We’re going to set the record straight on sunscreens. What is SPF? SPF stands for Sun Protection Factor. It refers to the amount of time that the product can block UVB rays. These are the burning rays. Unless the product is labeled broad spectrum, it most likely does not have any protection against UVA rays. These are the aging and cancer rays. What are UVA and UVB? UVA: stands for Ultraviolet A. These rays are longer and can penetrate through the clouds ...

“Will This Make Me Break Out?”

One of the most common questions that our skin coaches get is, "Will this make me break out?" Sometimes new products can cause breakouts to appear, but instead of freaking out and stopping usage, there are a few things to consider. Your breakout may be a sign that you are reacting negatively to an ingredient in the product, however it also could be your skin working towards becoming healthy. Watch the video below for Breakout and Acne Basics: Let's look at a few different types of breakouts and how to deal with them. Purging What it is: Purging is the process of removing dead skin cells and bringing supressed bacteria to the surface. This often occurs when you accelerate the cell turnover cycle by beginning a resurfacing or retinol routine. How to deal: Stick with it. Your skin is becoming healthier by getting out all of the trapped bacteria and oil beneath the surface. You need ...