Your official job title may not be Head of Lab at the Stanford Department of Dermatology, but you know skin care, weaving words like "acid mantle" and "moisture barrier [1]" into your everyday conversations and deciphering the ingredients list on the back of your mom's favourite serum [2] at dinner.
We know you're serious about what you smear on your face, and you're not afraid to go down a SkincareAddiction rabbit hole on Reddit to find it, but before you do, consider this: our trusted team of editors road-tested more skincare products [3] than there are skin clinics in New York City to bring you this list of award-winning face cleansers [4], creams, and treatments. Don't worry, even the strictest of dermatologists would approve.
Don't forget to read up on the rest of our 2019 Power Your Pretty Awards winners [5] – a curated list of beauty products tested by editors, chosen for YOU.
Innisfree Nourishing Cream With Ginger Honey
We're calling Innisfree Nourishing Cream With Ginger Honey [6] ($27) the "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" of facial moisturisers. The vat's star ingredients include — you guessed it — ginger and honey, which work simultaneously to soothe and hydrate the skin with impressive prosperity. But the unexpected surprise comes by way of its shea butter base, making for a rich, velvety texture that smears on with ease and leaves behind a protective (but never sticky) layer on the skin. Bonus: It moonlights as a great pre-makeup primer, too.
SkinCeuticals Glycolic 10 Renew Overnight Cream
There's Hailey Bieber's $500K engagement ring, and then there's your skin after using the SkinCeuticals Glycolic 10 Renew Overnight Cream [7] ($80). It contains a high concentration (as in, a whopping 10 percent) of exfoliating glycolic acid to boost cell turnover without disrupting your pH, which means it's the ideal treatment for someone after that bright, glowier-than-thou effect, but can't seem to shake the image of Samantha Jones after a chemical peel on Sex and the City [8].
Sunday Riley A+ High-Dose Retinoid Serum
Like a teacher's pet who raises their hand to every question in class, the Sunday Riley A+ High-Dose Retinoid Serum [9] ($85) is ingratiatingly hard-working — and a bit of a show-off (in a good way). The formula is powered by a potent blend of retinol — the rocket fuel of skincare ingredients that can blast away everything from breakouts to hyperpigmentation to fine lines — but counters any potentially harsh side effects with soothing botanicals like algae, white honey, bisabolol, and ginger. As a result, our skin looked clearer and more even in texture, earning itself a final grade of A++.
Tatcha The Dewy Skin Cream
Anyone who's ever ruined an omelette knows it's not just the ingredients that make a meal. It's everything else — the smell! The texture! The way it looks perched on the shelf in your home — that adds to its appeal. So while it's easy to love the Tatcha The Dewy Skin Cream [10] ($68) for its antioxidant-rich Japanese purple rice bran, skin-softening algae, and moisturising amino acids, we're convinced it's the featherweight consistency and impossibly smooth aftereffects that have catapulted this cream to "Top Chef-of-beauty" status.
Don't forget to read up on the rest of our 2019 Power Your Pretty Awards winners [11] – a curated list of beauty products tested by editors, chosen for YOU.