Why Your Skincare Routine Should Be Like a Jam Sandwich

Designing a skincare routine is hard. You have to diagnose your skin type and any skin conditions you want to address, then you need to find products that will work with your skin type/conditions then you have to work out in what order to apply them to your skin to be most effective.

This article covers that last point.

Making the Sandwich: Step 1

Any sandwich/routine needs bread. This is the possibly boring but necessary outer bit of the sandwich that holds in the juicy filling.

In skincare the bread is cleansing (the first bit of bread) and moisturising (the outer bit of bread).

Every skincare routine starts with a cleanse where you prepare the face for other lovely ingredients you might want to apply.

Filling the Sandwich: Step 2

The filling of the sandwich is any skincare product that you buy especially to do a job. You might have an antioxidant serum that you use in the morning to protect your face and a lovely oil that you apply in the evening to feed and moisturise the skin.

If you have multiple ingredients in your skincare sandwich you apply them from thinnest to thickest consistency. For example you might have an acid in your routine, these are usually thin and watery. This would be applied before an oil or a thicker serum.

Completing the Sandwich: Step 3

As mentioned above, the outer bit of bread in our sandwich is a moisturiser. Moisturisers are designed to lock in moisture plus anything else we might have applied to our face. If you skip this step the expensive filling in your skincare sandwich might evaporate or be rubbed off your face before it has a chance to do its job.

Carrying on the sandwich analogy, if you’re really into skincare you’ll probably have two routines - one for the morning (AM) and one for the evening (PM). For the purposes of this article that equates to two jam sandwiches that may have different types of bread and filling.

Your morning sandwich is always going to be topped off with an SPF and the filling will most often be a hydrating or antioxidant serum. Your evening sandwich might be a bit richer with layered acids and active ingredients that your skin will consume overnight.

Whatever your skin sandwich consists of consistency is key. Stick to the same sandwiches for at least 30 days. Swapping your routine too frequently might cause your skin to have indigestion :).