Hello, beautiful people! I’m sorry for the radio silence – I’ve been very tired and catching up on my beauty sleep. And what could be more fitting than the sleep-themed part two of my collaboration with Kirisikka, which just happened to be lined up next? The first part, should you have missed it, was about a Japanese style beauty ritual, and can be found here.
This second part is about beauty sleep. Sleep is one of the most wonderful and important things in world, and we should cherish it like we cherish good food. Eight hours of good sleep a night, plus a fifteen minute nap in the day will soften even the worst crow’s feet.
The best time to nourish the skin is when you’re asleep. Skin renewal is at its most effective after midnight, between one and three am; the skin is also more permeable during that time than it is during the daylight hours. Relaxing before bed is important for a good night’s rest, and you can do that by listening to soothing jingle-jangle music, for example, or meditating with stones.
Neal’s Yard Remedies has some relaxing aromatherapeutic beauty products provide relaxing aromatherapy, and promote better rest and nicer dreams.
The Beauty Sleep Concentrate is a beauty elixir that can be used in two ways: as a night cream for oily skin, applied after toner; or as a serum for dry skin, preceded by a toner and followed by a normal night cream. A good choice would be Neal’s Yard’s Vitamin E & Avocado Night Cream.
The Beauty Sleep Concentrate supports skin renewal and promotes restful sleep. It contains a mixture of relaxing oils like calary sage, cypress leaf, orange, patchouli and ylang-ylang. Calary sage is also an excellent remedy for menstrual pain, by the way.
The key ingredient as far as skin renewal is concerned is palmitoyl tripeptide-5, which sounds like pure gibberish. In the common tongue, peptides are made up of amino acids, and occur naturally in our bodies. The peptides used in cosmetics tell our skin cells to produce more collagen and to even out wrinkles. The tripeptides in Neal’s Yard’s Beauty Sleep Concentrate come from plant based palmitic acid.
That way you won’t wake up with shopping bags under your eyes. Neal’s Yard has just the thing for this as well; the Frankincense Eye & Lip serum. Besides tripeptides, the serum also contains algae, the Queen of anti-age ingredients, and brightening and relaxing Frankincense oil.
I usually round off this evening ritual by slathering my face, neck, and décolletage with the truly miraculous Wild Rose Beauty Balm. It is smoothing, brightening, and lasts forever. The lines on my décolletage from this summer are all but gone, thanks to this cream. For more information about the Wild Rose Beauty Balm, please go here.
Since there’s more to our skin than the bit on our faces, a full-body beauty treatment is a good way to maximize our chances of a good night’s rest. The Beauty Sleep Body Butter softens your skin all the way down to those hard and cracked heels. The creamy products contains the same relaxing oils as the Concentrate, with butters including cacao, shea, and sunflower seed – all rich in vitamin E, the absolute bomb for nighttime skin care.
Sweet dreams!
Neal’s Yard Remedies are available at Naturelle, amongst others. Using the code Katja15 at checkout will get you 15% off all Naturelle’s products until the end of November.
Photos Kirsikka Simberg/Musla
Translation Katja Nikula
