All About Eye Creams: Eye Care 101

There’s a lot of choice out there when it comes to skin care products and a lot conflicting information. Some specialists (including mechanics and truck drivers I’m told) assert that you don’t need a special product for under your eyes and that your regular moisturiser should do. I’m of the opinion that eye creams are essential for every age and skin type. Why? Well firstly, most of us know that the skin under and around our eyes is especially thin and produces less oils (it’s usually drier than the rest of our face). As such, the regular stresses our skin endures (UV rays, free radical damage etc) is two fold, showing up even quicker around the eyes. Along with that, our eyes ‘smile’ along with the other muscles in our face, creating laugh lines quicker. The under eye area can also have ‘unique problems’ that the rest of your face doesn’t deal with usually, and that includes under eye circles and puffiness. To me, an area such as the eyes would thus need a different targeted product to meet it’s needs. If the skin around my nose was very red, irritated and flaky, I would use a rich ointment to help heal the skin, stop the flaking and itchiness. I wouldn’t then use the same ointment all over my face, as it’s not necessary. You should always pick skin care products based on the needs of your skin and your skin concerns. That’s why I’m a fan of mixing and matching products from different lines. Lots of skin care companies also use ‘age recommendations’ for their products, but remember, every skin is different and has different needs, so don’t be afraid to step out of these ‘guidelines’.

If you are new to eye creams and the whole skin care thing, using an eye cream at all (day and night) is a great start! Your skin should look more hydrated (plumper), be more even in colour and make you look more awake (if it makes your under eye area or eyes itch, red or flaky – then you’ve probably experienced an allergic reaction to an ingredient in the product so discontinue use and after the symptoms have vanished, try something else!). For those of you a little older or if you are very into skin care and want to prevent any kind of damage (including lightning strikes!) I would suggest using two eye creams. Remember, t’s always easier to prevent damage than to fix damage that has already occured.

The reasoning behind this is a little like the reasoning behind using a day cream and a night cream for your face. During the day, you want your skin care to fight against UV rays, work well under makeup and protect your skin from external aggressors like free radicals. At night you want your skincare to replenish itself and most importantly, do the repair work it doesn’t have time to do during the day. For this reason, I would suggest using a lighter eye cream for during the day, so it sits well under makeup, brightens (so you don’t look tired), works against puffiness and contains some sort of antioxidants to protect your skin and with an spf if possible (wearing an spf around your eyes at night could irritate your under eye area and eyes). If your eye cream doesn’t include an spf, wear sunglasses when out and about and protect the eye area with a light high protection sunscreen on top of your skincare/makeup if out in the sun.

At night, you want an eye cream that will help repair your eye area from any damage that has occurred (vitamin A/Retinol is the best for this as it is proven to repair damage, however, it does make skin sensitive to the sun so only use it at night and protect your eyes from the sun during the day – or Vitamin C for repairing discolouration and for brightening) and provide it with even more hydration. If you are a little older, an eye cream with firming properties such as peptides would also be excellent.

If you are young but want to prevent damage, you can of course use eye creams targeted for the ‘first signs of ageing and wrinkles’ as they shouldn’t be as heavy as eye creams targeted for mature skins. If an eye cream blocks the pores of your skin, it can cause milia around the eye area (little white spots/balls – they ain’t so easy to get rid of either!) under the skin. Most people think these occur when a product is to ‘heavy’. Usually it’s not the consistency of the product that causes milia, but rather ingredients that block pores (e.g. an eye cream shouldn’t need colours or fragrances, which can block pores) like mineral oil (not all oils block pours however, so it pays to do a little research first).

I’m not a fan of the traditional ‘eye gels’ as they don’t usually provide lasting hydration throughout the day (they evaporate from the skin very quickly – hence a couple of hours after application, if not an hour later, there’s no sign of any eye gel or hydration).  Newer formulas are much better, but the simple eye gels with few ingredients don’t usually do much in protecting the skin around your eyes or hydrating. They do work however, to reduce puffiness very quickly, especially if chilled. If this is a problem you experience, a great solution is to store a simple eye gel in your fridge and upon waking up, give yourself an eye massage with the gel. Let the product sink in and once its almost completely gone or totally gone, apply your regular day eye cream to the area. If you plan to use an eye gel this way, look for ingredients like aloe vera, chamomile or eyebright (a herb very popular in Eastern Europe for use around the eyes as it relieves inflammation, swelling and eyestrain).  This is probably a easier than using tea bags on an everyday basis (or very often).

So what do I recommend/use? I’ve mentioned these two eye creams in separate posts before and they are what I’m currently using:

Day eye cream: Trilogy’s Eye Contour Cream (full review here). It’s texture/consistency is a hybrid (fancy!) between a gel and a cream. It’s light but contains hydrating ingredients and antioxidants (aloe vera, acai and rosapene  which is a combination of essentially fatty acid rich rose hip oil and antioxidants from tomato seeds and acai berry seed oils). No synthetic ingredients, colours or fragrances. It sits very well under concealer AND you get 20ml instead of the usual 15ml! so I’m a happy camper 😀

Night eye cream: Dermalogica Age Reversal Eye Complex (read more about it here). This eye cream has a cream consistency but definitely isn’t very heavy. It contains all the star ingredients needed for repairing the skin – retinol, vitamin C as well as licorice, rice bran, soy, niacinamide, bisabolol and caffeine  to help with brightening dark circles and discolouration.

Another eye cream I can highly recommend, even though I’m not using it currently (but I have gone through a couple of these!) is Ole Henriksen’s Fresh Start Eye Cream (you can read more about it and buy it here at Adore Beauty). It contains fine oils like wheat germ oil, grape seed oil (which also contains grape polyphenols – an antioxidant), vitamin E and A, Sodium Hyaluronate (a GREAT hydrator) as well as a whole host of other great ingredients. This is probably one eye cream that could be used day and night if you are starting out with eye creams or if you don’t have many ‘issues’ with your under eye area. As it is formulated to be worn day and night, I don’t think the level of vitamin A in the cream is very high (so it would be gentle) hence it’s probably fine to wear during the day (but wear sunscreen and protect your eyes just in case – as everyone should). You also get 28 grams in a jar, which is great!

With summer coming up, and since I get the occasional puffy eyes (usually after crying or a terrible sleep) I think I will ‘invest’ in a simple eye gel for de-puffing in the morning. They are usually pretty cheap, so it’s worth having one on hand me thinks!

What are your recommendations beauty bees in regards to eye creams? Let me know if you need more recommendations or extra info about anything in particular! AND don’t forget to join me on Facebook for more tips, news and shenanigans!

Beauty Bee~

Please follow and like us:

#Dermalogica #OleHenriksen #Skincare #Eyecare #EyeCreams #Skincare101 #Trilogy