A new skincare favourite

Growing up I suffered a lot from eczema and dry skin. I got through gallons of ointments, and can hardly remember a time when I wasn’t having to slather one kind of cream or another on my hands and arms. Thankfully I’ve for the most part grown out of this, and although I still have a tendency towards dry skin, I now lean towards products that I can use as little as possible. Perhaps in protest against my hyper-hydrated youth, I’ll now forego moisturisers wherever I can. I’ve written before about how I don’t really use lip balm anymore (linked here), and I’ve taken a similar approach to hand cream. This is for a similar reason. Contrary to their intention, I often find hand creams actually leave my skin drier, meaning I have to apply, apply apply! Not what I’m aiming for from my skincare at all. So on a day-to-day basis, I completely avoid hand creams.

However, there are times when you need a bit of extra help (I’m resisting the obvious pun here!). When there’s a cold snap in the weather, or you’re washing your hands lots, it’s natural for your hands to take a bit of a beating and need some reinforcements. This is the attitude I approached the Aveeno Intense Relief Hand Cream with. I was on the look out for an intensive product I could use sparingly, and which wouldn’t need to be re-applied time and again to make any difference. I’ve been really pleased with my choice. The cream performs really well with a single use, and I haven’t needed to keep re-applying to maintain the results. The cream has a nice thick texture, without being so thick that it’s tough to spread. I can dab on a small blob before I go to bed at night, and my hands will be smooth and soft in the morning.

The cream does leave a little bit of an oily residue, so isn’t ideal for daytime application, when you’ll be using your phone and typing on a keyboard – it could get a bit smeared. The packaging is made from 30% post-consumer recycled plastic, which is a nice nod to being environmentally friendly, but they could definitely make more effort on this front. I’m not quite sure if the tube itself is easy to recycle. It’s 2 HDPE, and it depends what the hard but not rigid material it’s made of counts as to whether you can send it for curb-side recycling or need to take it to soft plastic recycling. The tube is only 100g, so fairly small, and goes for around $11 in Chemist Warehouse. Certainly not a high-end price point, and although it’s not a huge quantity, I’m finding I don’t need to use much of it at a time, so it’s lasting well.

All in all, I’m really pleased with this product, and it’s become one of y new skincare favourites. I’m all for a product that allows me to use it as little as possible, and this does just that!

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Have you found the same thing with hand creams drying you out? Part me me thinks this is a deliberate ploy to keep you buying, but the less conspiracy-theory minded side of me think it’s just an unhappy side-effect of ingredients that work in the short term but can’t guarantee lasting results. Where do you sit on the minimalist to maximalist spectrum when it comes to skincare? Do you like me prefer to be sparing, or do you have a more is more approach? Share your thoughts and recommendations in a comment below, and thanks for reading!