Please don’t judge me…
… but last night I was indulging in some guilty pleasure TV, mindlessly watching Super Shoppers, when a fact that they spoke of suddenly caught my attention. The presenters explained how the average UK woman spends over £1500 a year on her skincare products – not makeup and skincare combined, just skincare. Wow. That’s the cost of a holiday right there, and a pretty nice one at that! It got me thinking – that’s a rather large sum for a country that’s supposed to be suffering with post recession and Brexit – and it shows that we all prioritise skincare, choosing the best that we can afford, and we are committed to investing in our skincare.
With this in mind, we’d all like to think that the skincare we are investing in, is actually going to work. We look to trusted sources (such as beauty blogs!) to find our recommendations and advice on how to use products, so that we can gain as much knowledge about a product as possible before making our investment. As beauty bloggers we understand the importance of this which is why I’ll start off by letting you know that this blog post is in collaboration with ZENii – and before writing a single word of this, I trialled the products for a minimum of 3 weeks so that I could let you know my true thoughts on them.
So, let me tell you a little more about the brand, why their products actually do what they say on the packaging, and how to make the most out of your current skincare routine!
An introduction to premium skincare
We’d like to think that meticulous thought and consideration has gone into the creation and formulation of our skincare products, but as the industry expands so rapidly, sadly that’s not the case with all brands. What gave me instant positive vibes about ZENii was the fact that the founder; multi award-winning Dr Johanna Ward, is one of the UK’s leading skin doctors. Now, if there’s someone that I’d trust when it comes to telling me what I need to put on my skin, it would be her. Johanna wanted to ensure her skincare line was created using clinically proven ingredients, and those of the highest quality. Her team use science and the study of skin health as the backbone of their product formulations, and their vision is to create a line of products that enhance our health and wellness with a rounded approach to skincare; what goes into the body, and what we apply to our skin.
The products are also paraben free, they do not test on animals, and the products are, where possible, created and manufactured right here in the UK. Triple gold stars!
Working from Within
Your Ultimate Skincare Routine
Skincare routines these days can be pretty daunting. There are a lot of great products out there, but how many of us know the correct order to apply them, and how much to use, and when? To get the most out of your skincare and make it work correctly and most efficiently, here are a few tips;
Cleanse your skin for about one minute in the mornings, using gentle massaging motions. Concentrate on areas of congestion such as the chin, nose and forehead to help drain toxins. Cleansing should be an enjoyable ritual, so choose a product that will be a pleasure to use as well as nourishing for the skin – ZENii’s Chamomile & Papaya cleanser is exactly that, purifying and refreshing while effectively helping to reduce cell build up and remove makeup and debris from the skin.
Next, tone or exfoliate to regulate the skin’s pH levels, and remove impurities and dead skin cells from the surface. Saturate a cotton wool pad with your product, and sweep over the skin before removing excess with a tissue. With 2% salicylic acid, ZENii’s Salicylic Exfoliator helps to control oil levels in the skin, and unclog ingested pores – making it excellent for dull or blemish prone skin. I prefer to use this step at night, giving my skin plenty of time to recover while I sleep, and opt for a more gentle toner in the mornings.
There’s no excuse not to protect your skin as you moisturise it, with so many day creams now containing a high level of SPF. Choose a consistency of your liking, whether that’s a gel or a cream, and apply to the back of your hand rather than dotting onto your face, and rub between your hands to activate the ingredients before using upward motions from the centre of your face to apply. By massaging onto he skin toward the hair line, you’re also helping to detoxify the skin, so also look out for a moisturiser packed with beneficial ingredients that our skin will love. ZENii’s moisturising sun protection cream is SPF 50 with Broad Spectrum UBA & UVB protection, and is also created with B5 and Aloe Vera, meaning your skin is nourished as well as protected.
Protect from Pollution
As a city dweller, I am very aware of the impact that pollution has on my skin. Whether it’s coming from smog, fumey car exhausts, dust or smoke, all of these factors can negatively affect our skin. The particles are 20x smaller than our pores and they can lead to dehydrated, damaged skin through radical oxidisation – and yep, it’s as nasty as it sounds! We need to make our skincare work for us in that it will create a barrier against these environmental pollutants, and for this, I’ve recently started using the ZENii Antioxidant Power Serum. Packed with skin antioxidants to repair and protect the skin, it helps the skin to fight back against the city smog.
Acting as an environmental shield, the serum is a simple step to add into your daily routine, but one that’s well worth adding. Protecting skin from UV radiation, toxins and pollution, it works by neutralising the free radicals in the skin which otherwise could oxidise in the skin and over time, damage and age the skin. No thanks!
