We all dread the day when our skincare routine seems to stop working. Sorting a range of products into a well-curated routine is no small feat, and when your perfect routine stops short of the results it used to deliver, it’s disappointing, to say the least. Youth To The People’s Director of Education Laura Cline has been there, done that, and knows quite well how to accelerate every product in your routine. It takes the addition of one simple step.

If you’ve ever wondered what comes first, cleansing or exfoliating, know that the confusion is understandable: though the two go hand in hand, there's an order to things.

Consider the following scenario: you have 30 seconds to pack your skincare essentials in a limited capacity bag for a month-long trip. In goes your daily cleanser and moisturizer, followed by eye cream and, hopefully, sunscreen. But what do you grab next? The answer is an activated, acid-based toner aimed at evening your complexion and smoothing your skin’s texture, plus a solution targeted at sloughing away dead skin cells that you can use as a more intensive exfoliation treatment a few times a week. 

Cleopatra was said to have bathed in milk—she and her famously smooth skin had a routine were lightyears ahead of her time, indulging in the many benefits of lactic acid for skin, which we know can be found in milk, or be 100% vegan and derived from corn sugar, like in the Kombucha + 11% AHA Exfoliation Power Toner. 

For most of us, a winter complexion equals a lackluster one, so you’ll want to seek out ingredients with brightening effects as you work towards replenishing your shelves with a new hero product, or perhaps entirely overhauling your routine. Formulations that include vitamin C and exfoliating acids—lactic and glycolic acid are your best bets here—effectively wipe away winter dullness to leave your complexion sparkling.

When we talk about skin appearing bright, we are talking about a number of different mechanisms that happen to skin during the aging process. Keeping an even skin tone is really difficult to do as we age, and we put forth a lot of effort to exfoliate (but not too much), hydrate, and protect. Hyperpigmentation can be a cause of skin tone unevenness and can be a precursor to the aging process. It can come from blemish scars and UV radiation, or both if left unprotected.

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