SKIN TYPES
- Combination
- Dry
- Dehydrated
- Normal
- Oily
- Sensitive
What is My Skin Type?
Treatments ~ Care Routine ~ Product Choice
Choosing correctly for skin treatments, a skin care regimen & purchasing skincare products means knowing your skin type
It is important not to confuse Skin Type with Skin Disorder or Skin Concern, such as acne vulgaris, rosacea, pigmentation, vascular, sun damage or fine lines and wrinkles. Different skin types are genetically determined but choosing the best skin treatments and skincare for your face and body is essential to care for your skin’s health, to slow the aging process and to look your best!
The health and beauty of your skin in later life, largely depends on what you eat and how you take care of yourself today.
Whilst everyone’s skin is a little bit different, your skin type can be generalised into one of five skin types, depending on how much oil (“sebum”) your skin produces.
The five skin types are:-
Combination ~ Dry ~ Normal ~ Oily ~ Sensitive
When it comes to identifying your skin type, we recommend you forget everything you’ve read or heard before! Much of the information given out by cosmetics salespeople, fashion magazines and even some dermatologists can be incorrect. Why? Because the information they rely on rarely takes into consideration the skincare products you’re currently using, which can have a major impact on your skin type. Read on and change that now.
While the typical categories of oily, dry, combination, and sensitive skin are good basics, they don’t address the wide variety of other problems or nuances that impact your skin. We list those nuances on this website as “skin concerns” and they include acne, sun damage from years of unprotected sun exposure, redness and sensitivity including rosacea, temperamental skin, clogged pores, or a combination of these “skin concerns”.
The 5 basic categories don’t take the degree of each skin type into consideration. For example “Dry Skin” could be dry to very dry, or “Oily Congested Skin” could be oily to very oily. Your skin type is rarely as simple as what the basic categories represent.
Whilst knowing your type can appear confusing, it is exceptionally important as it identifies everything about the texture and types of cosmeceutical and cosmetic products you should be using.
The more you know about your skin type, the more you’ll be able to help your skin look and feel as healthy and normal as possible
BASIC Skin Type Test
- Wash your face with a gentle cleanser and water. Use your hands to clean your face and avoid scrubbing too hard.
- Dry your face with a soft towel and leave your skin alone for one hour without applying any products or touching it.
- If your face feels tight and dry after about a half-hour to an hour after washing, you most likely have Dry skin.
- Alternatively, if you notice shiny patches popping up all over your face, that’s Oily skin.
- Combination skin will feel dry in some areas while oily in other parts of the face.
- Normal skin won’t feel either oily or dry after washing your face––it’ll just feel balanced, plump, and hydrated (hello, skincare goals).
- Sensitive skin is not actually a skin type. Sensitive skin is simply easily irritated skin, especially when you interact with new products or environments. A change of skincare will generally fix this.
If you are still uncertain as to your Skin Type we suggest you book a Skin Consultation and Analysis with our Skin Specialist.
Skin Type Treatments
To Treat Your Skin Correctly
You Need to Know Your Skin Type
Book a Skin Consultation with our Skin Specialist to Discuss Your Beauty Plan
Skin Type Skincare
Are your skincare products causing your skin concerns?
Whilst genetics (those that you inherited from your parents), environmental damage, sun damage from accumulated unprotected sun exposure, climate influences, your health, or a combination of these things can be primary or secondary causes of skin concerns, the skincare products you are currently using can also be hiding your real skin type. When skincare products contain harsh, abrasive, or skin-aggravating ingredients, they can often trigger problems and disguise your true natural skin type.
Dry Skin
For example, if you have dry skin using the wrong products can make your dry, flaky skin worse. Harsh cleansers including most bar soaps, or products containing alcohol denatured (denat.), peppermint, menthol, mint, citrus, eucalyptus, and all fragrance, whether natural or synthetic, are most likely drying your skin out and even damaging it.
See our DRY SKIN recommended skincare products
Oily Skin
Oily skin happens when the sebaceous glands in the skin make too much sebum. Sebum is a waxy, oily substance that protects and hydrates the skin. The causes of oily skin are varied. It is typically hereditary, however, it can also be a result of environmental, aging, lifestyle factors or on many occasions is exacerbated by the skincare products you are currently using. The fact is that many of the products claiming to get rid of oil actually make matters worse because they contain ingredients that aggravate the skin and trigger more oily shine. And because Sebum is needed to hydrate the skin, one must be careful not to apply products that reduce the oil content to the point that your skin becomes dehydrated as this will actually cause increased oil production. A wicked circle indeed.
See our OILY SKIN recommended skincare products
Acne – Congested Problem Skin
If you have acne and you aren’t using products containing the critical ingredients of salicylic acid or benzoyl peroxide, you’re unlikely to ever get the bumps and clogged pores under control, or in most cases what you are applying to your skin is simply making matters worse.
Harsh ingredients and emollients have similar effects on Oily Skin types, exasperating the oil issues.
See our ACNE SKIN recommended skincare products
Sensitive Skin
And SENSITIVE skin? Apply harsh product contents to any skin and you will most likely get a reaction that might make you think you naturally have sensitive skin. In reality, everyone has sensitive skin, admittedly some more than others particularly those suffering from rosacea, but getting your skincare products right will go a long way to desensitising your skin.
There are plenty of factors that can make sensitive, reactive, red and rosacea-prone skin worse! Sun exposure, wind, heat (especially from saunas and spas), emotional stress, spicy foods, alcohol, and caffeine are all well-known triggers. Less well-known triggers include the havoc that results from some skincare ingredients and products.
For sensitive skin, it’s incredibly important to start calming, hydrating and nourishing your skin, and it’s important you start NOW! Doing nothing or just the bare minimum means the redness and sensitivity are likely to worsen. Again, we recommend avoiding scrubs, harsh cleansing brushes, and aggravating ingredients, including alcohol (SD or denatured), menthol, mint, citrus, and lavender. It is vitally important to keep sensitive skins skin drenched in skin type-appropriate hydration and skin-defending, soothing antioxidants.
See our SENSITIVE SKIN recommended skincare products
Normal Skin
So, what about those lucky enough to have the all-elusive 5th skin type, “NORMAL SKIN”? Truly normal skin (meaning perfect skin) is the exception rather than the rule, and what most people are experiencing is “normal skin plus”; that is, normal skin mixed with other issues that are unrelated to skin types, such as wrinkles, sun damage, and brown spots. Essentially, your skin may feel normal, but it isn’t perfect, and over time it is changing. Intrinsic aging marches onward as we naturally mature and identifying your skin type now is just as important as for any of the other skin types, and choosing the best skincare products and skin care treatments NOW will contribute immensely to Preventative Aging.
See our NORMAL SKIN recommended skincare products
You see, it’s incredibly easy to alter your natural skin type with the wrong products and you may be spending good money and wasting time trying to solve a skin concern that your current skincare products are actually causing!