Aka how to pick products for the 7 Skins technique and how to slot it into the rest of your The Ordinary routine, paying particular attention to how to choose products and which ones are available in the UK. Plus a list of the best products to suit you.

7 Skins is the hot new trend in skincare, multiple layers of hydration are a feature of Asian skincare routines and now westerners are starting to get in on the action and are realising that this thing bloody works. Essentially it is the practice of patting on several layers of hydration to fully hydrate and plump up the skin.

There has been a lot of articles written about this. My good friend Jo has a great article on the Deciem chatroom website that covers the basics very well. I want to get into the intricacies of it, take it a little further. If the Deciem Chatroom guide is for absolute beginners, then this is a guide for people who have the basics and still have questions.

Like these questions- Do you have to use a specific toner 7 times, what qualifies a product to be used as a skin, what if I want to use an acid, retinoid. I have some other great posts for putting together a The Ordinary routine- the cheatsheet, what products to choose. I thoroughly recommend looking at your cleansing routine also, if hydration is an issue for you. There are a lot of 7 skins ins and outs, and I will elucidate you. 

Is 7 Skins Really Effective?

Before I started researching the topic, I was nearly fully convinced that the whole 7 Skins thing was just a ploy thought up by asian skincare companies to sell more toner. But, reading studies on hydration really put me in my place. When you hydrate skin, you put water into it and plump it up temporarily but you also allow the skin to function correctly. Oily skin is made only oilier by dehydration and dry skin types become rough and scaly.

The epidermis is where skincare does it’s thing and it’s the main barrier between the inside of the body and the out. This is how it works-

The skin has a natural process it goes through where skin cells lose their nucleus and die off, work their way to the surface and are lost into space. The dead skin cells at the surface aren’t just unnecessary and unwanted. They actually form a protective layer and are filled with important chemicals that help protect the inside of the body from toxins and bacteria and prevent water from getting out. These useful chemicals are called Natural Moisturising Factors. They help trap water in the upper skin and keep the pH just right for repelling bacteria. 

When the skin is dehydrated the process of losing dead cells gets screwed up- the enzymes that break the bonds between the skin cells don’t function properly. Skin becomes scaly and rough. 

Keeping skin hydrated isn’t just a matter of sticking water on it you also need chemicals that the skin can accept to keep the water where we want it.. 

If we choose skincare that contains molecules that naturally occur in NMF then the skincare will be more effective at hydrating the skin. The chemicals in NMF are thus-

These are the chemicals we are looking for in our hydrating products- amino acids, sodium pca, lactic acid and urea. Glycerin and Hyaluronic Acid also has a heavy presence in the upper layers of the skin and they draw moisture like nobody’s business. These are the words you want to look for in the ingredients list of your “skins”.

What Products to use for the 7 Skins Technique

So the principal behind 7 skins technique is using toners, essences and serums to fully hydrate the skin and add barrier helpful ingredients. This should bring skin to it’s optimum health and will work in dry skin types, oily skin types (the skin tends to produce oil as a response to being dehydrated), acne prone skin types (hydrated skin forms a better barrier against bacteria) and to reduce the appearance of aging.

When it comes to product choice, I find the terminology difficult myself- can a toner be used for 7 skins? why is a toner different to an essence? There is no legal definition. In general, toners are meant to be used after cleansing to rebalance the pH. Then essences hydrate and nourish. Ampoules and lotions tend to be thicker and contain active ingredients. As long as they are humectant, a product can be used for 7 skins. You can apply as many layers as you see fit. When your skin feels hydrated, not absorbing any more product, or you have become bored of doing it, move on to the next stage.

Ok so, before we get on to the routine stuff, I have put together this awesome table with lots of the most popular products for 7 skins hydration and lots of details. This will give you an idea of what to look for-

Because I’m in the UK there’s a British focus to the products I put in the table, you can get them all in the UK. The Asian products you might need to get shipped from Yesstyle, which can take a while but it’s fine. The ratings I picked from whatever website had the most ratings- eg MakeupAlley. 

You don’t have to have 7 separate products for 7 skins.  You can use the same product 7 times, or 2 products a few times each, you don’t have to do seven layers. It’s very adaptable and personal. 7 skins is just an easy to remember catchy name for hydration. Look for a product with humectants (see graphic below) and layer as many times as seems reasonable.

How to add Seven Layers of Hydration into your The Ordinary Routine

If you have a look at the above table you will notice that The Ordinary products don’t actually come up that cheap per 100ml, compared with the other product. Marine Hyaluronics is £19.66 per 100ml, whereas Pyunkang Yul is £6 per 100ml. You might not want to be slapping on 7 layers of The Ordinary, oddly enough, it would be very expensive.

You’ll want to find another hydrating product that you can use with gay abandon. Which product you choose is entirely up to you, there’s no wrong answer. You might want to pick something watery and something thicker eg. Simple Kind to Skin Soothing Toner for few couple of layers and a couple of layers of Hado Labo Premium. If you use 7 layers of a gel hydrator like Hado Labo Premium, things might get pretty sticky.

As a rule of thumb products go on in order of consistency- toner, water based serums, thicker serums, oils, moisturisers. But there are some issues that come up-

• Where does my acid fit in? Acids go straight after cleansing on dry skin always. I have run my own tests using my skin pH meter. I wanted to check how layers of hydration affected the pH of the skin after an alpha hydroxy acid. The third layer of hydration brought the skin’s pH back up. So you can get away with an exfoliating acid and two layers of hydration without affecting the effect of the acid. You could call it a day at that point and then moisturise, alternatively,  you could wait for the acid to do it’s thing then move on to hydration, say after 30 minutes.

  

• Where does my retinoid/tretinoin fit in?– If you’re a beginner with retinoids, it is important to only apply to dry skin. Retinol isn’t as strong as tretinoin so the dry skin thing is maybe not as important. Do your 7 skins hydration, allow it to absorb then move onto the retinoid/tretinoin. The seven skin will nourish the skin and reduce irritation and purging.
• Where do I put water based serums if I’m doing 7 skins?– Serums like Buffet, Argireline, Matrixyl, Niacinamide, Ascorbyl Glucoside should go close to the skin at the beginning of the 7 skins routine near to the skin and count as a layer of hydration.
• Heavier products like Azaleic Acid, Magnesium Ascorbyl Phosphate or Vitamin C 23%/30% go after the hydration– they are both ok on damp skin, so no need to give an extended period of time for absorption. Just apply straight after hydration then move onto moisturiser.
• NMF and oils also go after hydration– these are very important , you shouldn’t skip moisturising after hydration, they go hand in hand. There is almost no point in hydrating unless you moisturise. Its the icing on the cake. Moisturiser seals in all those lovely layers of hydration you added.

7 Skins + The Ordinary Summary

The take home message is that hydration is good, it’s worth checking out, no matter what your issue is. 

• Acids and tretinoin need to be used on dry skin. Acids go before 7 skins, tretinoin/retinol goes after it fully absorbs.
• Water based serums including acids can count as a “skin” and go at the beginning of the routine.
• Definitely choose fragrance and alcohol free toners and essences
• A “skin” can be a toner, essence, serum or ampoule, it just needs to have humectant ingredients- see list above

If you find you’re getting worsening of skin issues after starting 7 skins method, then await my second post on the topic and I’ll go through all the issues. I know this all sounds like a daunting amount of effort, but really it’s just a bit of extra emphasis on hydration and it can reap tremendous benefits. Going by the personal experiences on the Deciem Chatroom, there are a lot positive reports. There is also a podcast which goes with this on Skincare with Friends, available on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify,  Stitcher… come and join my chatroom.

Reference-

Verdier-Sévrain, S., & Bonté, F. (2007). Skin hydration: a review on its molecular mechanisms. Journal of Cosmetic Dermatology, 6(2), 75–82. doi:10.1111/j.1473-2165.2007.00300.x 

This post is not sponsored by anyone, Mr 7 Skins didn’t gift me any products, but the links are affiliate, click and spend and I get a quid and I thank you for that.