6 hacks for a chin-to-toe party glow

The body-smoothing version of the double-cleanse, it’s the fast track to softer skin. Using a grainy sugar or salt scrub (Omorovicza’s Gold Sugar Scrub is fantastic), first use it on dry skin before you shower, really working over dry shins, knees and elbows. Then step under the shower and repeat on damp skin.

I got this great tip from a spa therapist. Have a long soak in a hot bath and, once your skin is super saturated (fingers look puckered and prune-like), only then do you do a skin scrub – it works a dream on buffing off winter-dry skin. Even better, add Epsom salts to the water (great for fluid retention) or Dead Sea Salts (especially good for dry skin, or any skin issues).

Cold weather, indoor heating and woollen clothing leach moisture out of our skin, making skincare an essential – my favorites include Augustinus Bader The Body Cream (as good for the body as it is for the face), Seed to Skin The Devotion Restorative Body Balm and Costa Brazil Body Cream. But, while creams and oils are both good, combined they take nourishing and hydrating to a whole other level. I use a 2:1 ration (two-thirds cream to one-third oil) but adjust as your skin needs. It’s the game-changer for chronically dry, rough skin, especially on the backs of your arms and legs.

Certain problems require specific products, and these are the ones I think go above and beyond. For bumpy skin on arms or legs, in-growing hairs, or chronically dull, dry skin, Dr Lancer’s The Method: Nourish body cream smooths with glycolic, plus it deeply hydrates and gives a great instant blurring effect to bare limbs – I can’t praise it enough. La Mer’s The Neck and Décolleté Concentrate works as a clever serum for skin that needs plumping up and smoothing out. For desert-dry skin, a few nights slathering on Sarah Chapman’s omega-rich Overnight Body Treatment makes the sort of difference you can see. It was created to streamline puffy legs, but I use Legology Air-Lite chin-to-toe throughout summer and the winter party season.

Already a convert to their excellent face firmer, the NuBody is seriously effective – I saw a difference in smoothness from the first time I used it on my upper arms (it was short-term, but enough to get me through an evening in a strapless dress). Using microcurrent, it works on the skin and, used regularly, the results are lasting – and visible. The Esker ridged roller does for the body what the hugely popular rose quartz rollers have already done for the face. Calming and depuffing, I suggest using it chilled from the fridge after a body cream. Alternatively, the super-popular Gua Sha tools can also be used on the body to help define and de-puff upper arms, stomachs and legs. Just use with oil (or water while in the shower) and work in one direction only until skin looks a little red (to show circulation is boosted).

Cheat your way to incredible looking skin in an instant. Adding color, glow and definition to bare limbs, these are best skin finishers. Huda Beauty’s N.Y.M.P.H (in three shades) is super sheeny – a little goes a long way – but it looks especially beautiful mixed with body lotion for all over glow. Charlotte Tilbury Supermodel Body is already a classic – again, I prefer to mix it into a body cream to use over bare skin and then use it ‘neat’ to highlight shoulders, shins and collar bones. For more sheen and less color, La Mer’s Soleil de la Mer After Sun Enhancer is a beautiful treatment lotion with a soft sheen that makes skin look instantly airbrushed.

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