How To Get Better Skin In 2 Weeks

Source: Gabe Ginsberg/Getty Images

Better skin in two weeks? We know it sounds too good to be true, but with the right regime and skincare rituals, you can seriously improve your skin within a fortnight – as long as you’re committed to the cause! This means you need to ditch those bad habits and instead, treat your skin like an absolute queen. The first week is all about detoxing and cleansing your skin, while week two is all about hydrating, soothing and healing your skin, so when you cross the finish line, your skin is radiant AF. Here’s how you do it:

Get Your Beauty Hygiene In Check

There’s literally zero point in maintaining good skincare rituals if you have bad beauty hygiene that will counteract all of the hard work you’re putting in. This means you need to know what not to do. Otherwise, you’ll inadvertently transfer dirt, oil, and impurities back onto your skin, which will block your pores and could even trigger a breakout. So start the cleanse clean with these three steps:

1. Wash your pillowcase and bed sheets: When you sleep, your body temperature naturally rises, and your skin starts to repair (it’s called beauty sleep for a reason!), during this process, you’ll also transfer sweat and dead skin debris onto your pillowcase. If you don’t wash your pillow regularly, you’ll transfer this back onto your skin, as well as any remaining product or dirt from your hair – yuck. Try to wash your pillowcase at least once a week, and flip it over halfway through the week for a fresh side.

2. Clean your makeup brushes: Your makeup brushes can turn into a breeding ground for dirt and bacteria if not cleaned often enough – we recommend once a week, and rinsing your makeup sponge every time you use it.

3. Wash your hands before you apply your makeup: You’d never eat a meal without washing your hands first, so the same rules should apply for makeup application.

Daily Habits For Your Best Skin Ever:

1. Cleanse

Cleansing – it’s basically the cornerstone of good skin. If you don’t cleanse properly, your pores will be congested and blocked, and your skin will be prone to blackheads. This means finding the right cleansing formula for your skin type is essential; the most common formulas are foam, milk, oil, and gel. Check out this post to find what cleansing formula will work for you.

Source: Tatcha, Garnier

In the evening, always double cleanse to ensure you thoroughly remove makeup, oil and dirt – our fave K-Beauty hack. It’s super simple: First, cleanse with a cleansing oil, and then cleanse again with a foam, milk or gel formula (depending on your skin type). This will ensure that all of the dirt and makeup is removed from your skin and provide a much more thorough cleanse. Check out out our full guide to cleansing here.

Products to Try: We’re obsessed with the Tatcha Pure One Step Camellia Cleansing Oil, $48, as it contains antioxidant and vitamin-rich camellia oil that rebalances the skin and leaves it with a radiant glow. Although, the Garnier Micellar Oil-Infused Cleansing Water, $5, is another great, more affordable option.

2. Tone

Toning will remove any lingering makeup, rebalance your skin’s pH level, while toning and tightening your pores, reducing the penetration of impurities. You can tone in the morning with something lightweight and clarifying and at night with something a little more intense. Make sure to choose a toner for your skin type, which is essential and will help avoid irritation.

Source: Innisfree

Products to Try: We love the Innisfree Green Tea Seed Intensive Hydrating Toner, $19, a super hydrating toner that helps to strengthen your skin’s moisture barrier. If you want to save $$$, you can always DIY your own toner with one cup of rose water, one teaspoon of glycerin, and one teaspoon of witch hazel, which has astringent properties. Then using a cotton pad, swipe the DIY toner across your face after cleansing.

3. Moisturize

Unless your skin is hydrated, it’ll never bring its A-game. You don’t need to splurge, but it is super important that you find a moisturizer that works well for your skin type (find the right formula for your skin here). Typically, oily and acne-prone skin types should opt for a lightweight gel moisturizer, while dry skin needs a thicker, cream formula. Moisturizing twice a day is also essential; even if you have oily skin, as if you skip this step, your skin will try to compensate by producing more oil.

Source: Biossance, Tarte

Products to Try: Our go-to moisturizer is the Biossance Squalane + Probiotic Gel Moisturizer, $52, a moisture-balancing, probiotic-infused formula that helps to calm and soothe redness. The Tarte Rainforest Drink of H2O Hydrating Boost Moisturizer, $46, is another dope moisturizer made with marine ingredients. Find out why marine ingredients are so beneficial for your skin here.

4. SPF

If you’re not using SPF daily, you need to start now. Like for real, it’s THE MOST important thing you can do for your skin, as 90% of how your skin ages is within your control and is directly linked to sun exposure. Make sure you’re using at least SPF 30 with a five-star UVA rating.

Source: Thank You Farmer, Goop

Products to Try: Our go-to SPF is the Thank You Farmer Sun Project Water Sun Cream, $23; it’s super lightweight so it’ll absorb quickly into the skin. We also love the Supergoop Unseen Sunscreen, $32, as it’s free of oil and fragrance, plus it’s packed with antioxidant-rich shea butter and meadowfoam.

5. Gua Sha

Source: Dasha Petrenko/Shutterstock

Gua Sha is an ancient skin ritual where a smooth, blunt instrument is pressed against the skin using long strokes to release stagnant energy. The form of facial massage will also boost lymphatic drainage: the process that removes toxins from the skin and reduces swelling. If you use it daily for two weeks, you’ll be on your way to tighter, less inflamed skin, and a more sculpted face in no time. Check out out our full guide to doing Gua Sha at home here. If you feel like splashing out, the MDNA SKIN Beauty Roller, $200, is a total game-changer – it helps to energize, lift, firm, and boost skin hydration, and retexturize fine lines and wrinkles. Read our full review here.

Make sure you’re applying your skincare routine in the correct order by following our layering guide:

Weekly Skin Rituals For Your Best Skin

Week 1…

Exfoliate

While you shouldn’t exfoliate daily, it’s still an integral step in your skincare routine, so we suggest exfoliating twice a week. There are two types of exfoliators; chemical and physical exfoliators. We prefer chemical exfoliators as they gently remove dead skin and clear out pores without risking removing any healthy skin.

Source: Ren Skincare, Pixi

Products to Try: We love the Ren Skincare Clean Skincare Glycol Lactic Radiance Renewal Mask, $56, as it contains natural lactic and glycolic acid. However, if you have sensitive or dry skin the PIXI Glow Tonic, $15, will offer gentle exfoliation.

Use A Clay Mask

Since the focus of week one is purifying and detoxing your skin, a clay mask is ideal. Clay will help extract any oil or impurities in your pores – you can see the oil gather as it’s pulled from your pores – it’s gross, yet oddly satisfying.

Products to Try: We’ve been using the L’Oreal range of clay masks, $13, for months! There’re six in total, each mask targeting a different skin issue. Read our full review here. We’re also huge fans of the Aztec Indian Healing Clay, $11, which is a huge tub of dry clay that you can concoct your own extracting solutions with.

Brighten Your Skin

By introducing vitamin C to your skin, you’ll provide a surge of antioxidants that’ll brighten and illuminate the skin. Vitamin C serums will also help lighten any dark spots, so if your skin is prone to hyperpigmentation, make sure you’re using a vitamin C product.

Source: Vichy, Drunk Elephant

Products to Try: We (like everyone else in the beauty world) are obsessed with the Drunk Elephant’s C Firma Vitamin C Day Serum, $80. We also like the Vichy Liftactiv Vitamin C Serum, $29, it literally smells and tastes like oranges. In fact, for a super quick DIY, you can actually use orange juice: just soak a cotton pad with OJ and sweep it across your face after cleansing.

Address Pimples

Everyone gets the occasional pimple, and if you do want to get rid of them ASAP, we know how.

Source: Mario Badescu, COSRX

Products to Try: The Mario Badescu Drying Lotion, $17, has been our sole solution to pimples for years. Just pop the solution on your pimple before you sleep, and when you wake up in the morning, it will have massively shrunk. We’re also obsessed with pimple stickers – another K-Beauty invention. We love the super affordable COSRX Acne Pimple Master Patch, $5; they come in different sizes so you can combat even the fiercest spots. Check out some of our other fave quick healing spot solutions here.

Week 2…

Use A Sleeping Mask

As week two is all about healing and hydration, a sleeping mask is an essential. In Korea, some women use a sleeping mask every night, although we think three times a week is plenty! A sleeping mask is like a supercharger night cream that’ll enhance the regeneration process that naturally occurs when your sleep. The mask will also act a barrier preventing moisture loss.

Source: Laneige, Glow Recipe

Products to Try: For dry skin, we love the Glow Recipe Avocado Melt Sleeping Mask, $45, and for oily skin, the gel formula of the Laneige Water Sleeping Mask, $25, is perfect, and it smells like a spa as it’s infused with orange flower and rose.

Give Yourself A DIY Facial

Ok, so once you’ve reached midweek (week two), it’s all about chasing that glow. So it’s time to give yourself the ultimate DIY facial. While we’ve covered most of the steps – cleanse, cleanse, exfoliate, mask, tone, moisturize – we also love to do a facial steam after cleansing and before we apply a face mask (find out how to steam like a pro here), to open your pores and hydrate your skin. For more deets on our DIY facial ritual, check out this post.

Skin-Saving Lifestyle Habits

via Giphy

If you speak to any model with perfect skin, they’ll tell you their secrets to better skin are simple: get a good night sleep and drink plenty of water. Ok, so while we know there are many more elements to healthy skin (namely great genes), unless you’re drinking plenty of water (at least two liters a day) and getting enough zzz’s (at least 7 hours, preferably 8), and eating as clean as your skin ritual (which means staying away from these five foods), your skin will not be living its best life. So if you’re serious about this two-week skin cleanse, try and adopt these lifestyle choices too. We promise at the end of week two when your skin is gleaming, your smile will be beaming.

Let us know if you’re going to try this out, and keep us posted with your progress. Remember, you don’t need to stop at two weeks – we do this every day!