Tone deaf?
Tuesday, October 26, 2010 Posted by Matt
Cleanse, Tone and Moisturise is our most basic skin care routine these days. Cleansing and Moisturising are pretty much self-explanatory but what about Toning? What exactly is it? This part used to be a complete mystery to me, so I just missed it out. But, then when I wanted to take my skin regime more seriously I started looking into toners. What I found confused me even more.
There are different types of toners which all do different things, from astringent toners to conditioning toners and freshening toners; skin tonic toners to hydrolat toners.
Originally, toners were used in the days when cleansers were made from oil, and as oil and water don’t mix you needed something to remove the oily residue from the skin. So, the toners were highly alcohol-based because removed the excess oil.
Alcohol-based toners are still around these days and marketed to people with either oily or blemish prone skin. The only problem with this type of toner is that the high alcohol content can strip the skin of its oil, which then causes the skin to produce even more oil to compensate and thus defeats the whole object. Gentle toners are now recommended for people, no matter how oily their skin type.
A lot of toners are applied with cotton wool pads and rubbed over the skin. This helps to remove excess cleanser and make up when a cold cream type cleanser has been used or when the skin hasn’t been rinsed adequately. Now the best type that I have found are spray on toners (or spritzes). They are just so easy to use - spray onto your skin and leave it to soak in, or spray on and then pat it in with your fingers.
Great ones to use are Eve Taylor Toners. Hydrolat based and come in 3 easy to navigate types - Soothing, balancing and purifying. Each is hydrating and helps to even out the porosity of your skin so that your moisturiser absorbs evenly.
They can be used throughout the day as well to generally hydrate your skin and are great when you’re in buildings with air conditioning and at winter time when all that dehydrating central heating is on.
It’s easy now to include the toning step to you regime, so get spritzing!
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