Ask A Pro: How To Cleanse Your Skin

by Erica Shaw February 23, 2023

It’s the first step in everyone’s skincare routine, and yet many of us are not doing this step justice. Washing our face has to be one of the most misunderstood steps in the skincare routine, but it doesn't have to be!

I was recently asked a skincare question from a dear friend, and it triggered my memory that before beauty school, I struggled with feeling like my skin was clean from just washing it alone. I didn't know the basics of facial cleansing and in turn, ended up being overly rough with my skin in an attempt to “feel clean”.

So, I decided it was time to go back to basics, and just focus on getting your cleansing step on point so you don’t struggle with either over doing it, or not doing it justice at all.

Quite a few years ago, I was reading an article in a magazine about the Ayurvedic practice of rinsing one’s face with cold water seven times upon waking up. This process is to rinse off sleep, and be ready and cleansed for the day. For the life of me, I cannot remember much more than that, and my procrastinator side has resulted in never looking further into it.

Alas, I do try and adhere to this when I wash my face in the morning and I have noticed an improvement in my overall skin tone. I cannot 100% connect that to the rinsing, but it doesn’t hurt to give yourself a cool little morning splash. Just remember, getting your face wet does not count as washing it, more on that later…

When it comes to washing you face, there are a lot of methods/movements/tools and products to use. What I learned in school was the Dermalogica Double Cleanse method, which has very specific, but fluid hand movements, just for the cleansing step.

Whatever method you use, here are some basic rules of thumb when it comes to hand motions on the face:

Always go in an upward and outward motion, meaning up towards your hairline and out to the sides of your face.
Don’t drag skin, you do not need to get rough or extra aggressive, trust me if you’re cleansing right, a mild touch will do the trick.
If it’s a foamy cleanser - get it foamy before applying to your face. If it’s not foamy but cream based, simply spread into damp hands and massage into skin.
Avoid the eyes, not every cleanser is meant for the eye area. However, it is very important to cleanse the eye area, more on that in a future blog!
Perform your cleansing movements on your skin for 60-90 seconds before rinsing.
Thoroughly rinse your skin, use a facial sponge or soft facial cloth if needed. Again, do not over do this and scrub your face with a wash cloth, no scrubbing is required here!

Keep these as ground rules that to live by when cleansing your beautiful face. Remember, the skin on our face and neck is different and more delicate than that on the rest of our body, so be nice to it!

This is something I hear way too often in the treatment room:

Me: So tell me what your skincare routine is?

Client: Oh, I wash my face with water.

silence

Me: And?

People, do you wash your body, your hair, YOUR DISHES with only water and call them clean? NO! So please, do not think that throwing water on your dirty skin and drying it off is doing anything other than getting your dirty skin wet.

Benefits of daily face washing:

The removal of dirt and debris we pick up throughout our day, as well as the toxins we excrete from our skin while we sleep
Proper cleansing allows the flora and fauna of our skin’s surface to function
Your skin is one of your first lines of defense from outside threats/toxins, cleansing it and feeding it healthy skincare allows for healthier cell metabolism and oxygenation. Basically, you’ll glow and fight cooties.

If you didn’t get my analogy earlier of why “washing” your face with only water doesn’t count, go ahead and wash all your dishes and laundry this week without soap. Tell me how it goes 🙃

I’ve already ranted for long enough on why water is not a cleanser, so moving on to more crazy things we do in the quest of squeaky clean skin.

Let’s start with the Do’s:

Have designated towels for drying your face, this will minimize bacteria and cross contamination.
Cleanse with warm water, not burning hot and not ice cold. There are other ways to incorporate heat and cold to your skincare routine.
Keep your cleanser consistent, don’t mix it up too often. At any given time you don’t want to have more than three in rotation.
Cleanse for 60-90 seconds
Always follow your cleansing step with (at the bare minimum) a moisturizer.
Your cleanser is chosen based on your skin type. If you are not sure what your skin type is, check out my blog about skin types here.

Now for our friend, the Don’ts:

Do not scrub, your exfoliant should do that for you. Check out my Throw It Out Thursday blog myth busting exfoliation here.
Using a facial wipe is a foundation step, but does not count as washing your face. There is still dirt and debris that needs soap and friction to remove. If you are using it to remove makeup, all its really doing is get some off and then just smearing the rest around. Do yourself and your skin a favor, and double cleanse.
Only use tools specifically labeled for the face, no pumice or scrubbing loofas used please! A Clarisonic is a great tool and can bump up your cleansing step, just don’t push it into your skin.
The harsher, NOT BETTER. You don’t need to strip your skin to literally get it squeaky clean, the only time it should be like that is during a professional peel.
Don’t skimp on cleansing and then pile product/makeup on your skin
And lastly, rinsing your face with water DOES NOT COUNT AS CLEANSING

These are some pretty common ones that I run into, I am sure there are many more do’s and don’ts that we could get into, but for sake of reading let’s stick with those. Now that you are cleansing your skin properly, have you heard about the double cleanse?

This might be the straw that breaks the camels back for some people, but for those who need a double cleanse it shouldn’t. That’s right I’m looking at you makeup wearers, or those who work in a “dirty” job and come home with a load of dirt and debris on them. If you sweat at work, wear makeup, or feel extra oily and yucky at the end of the day, you all need a double cleanse!

A “double cleanse” is when you use two different cleansers, and wash your face twice. The purpose is the first cleanse is to removes makeup, moisturizer, surface debris, etc. and the second cleanse is more meant for cleansing your skin type, or a targeted treatment cleanser like the Glycolic Cleanser in the picture above.

This isn’t for everybody, and to be honest, I don’t double cleanse every day. I only double cleanse when

a. I feel super grimy

b. I had a makeup wearing day.

Since working from home and being on more zoom meetings, I haven’t been wearing that much makeup, so I haven’t had to cleanse twice every night like I was when I was working. Everything I wrote about cleansing above applies to both steps in the double cleanse.

The most important thing is to make sure you suds up and rinse thoroughly! Oh and that you're using the right cleanser for your Skin Type 🤓 I hope that wasn’t too much information and hating on water as a cleanser… Here is to you feeling confident about your self care, your skincare and most importantly making sure you’re doing it right!

Till next time, be good to your skin and even better to yourself,

xx eri