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Beauty Bible Beauty Clinic
Welcome to our new weekly column on the YOU magazine website, www.you.co.uk Below you will find the current question and our advice, with a list of where to source the products mentioned. To look at past columns, click here. And for lots more solutions to your beauty dilemmas, visit Q&A, just click here.
March 15th, 2009: Puffy Eyes
Q I very often wake up with puffy eyes, and while they're not horrendous, they would be better banished! (Or at least minimised.) Any suggestions?
A The first one is low cost - ice cubes! Please get a cube of ice from the fridge, wrap it in cling film or a cotton hankie – or use unwrapped if you are stoic - and stroke it around the eye area, in an outward direction (or try circles round the eye zone), which will help to smooth away the puffiness. The cooling and tightening effect is amazing. In fact, some beauty therapists and dermatologists in Switzerland recommend doing it daily as an anti-ageing measure – and supermodels swear by it. Splashing your eyes with water with ice cubes in it is another good option, though not quite as effective in our experience.
A friend who suffers in the same way praises two products: Origins No Puffery cooling mask for puffy eyes, £17.62 for 30ml (it does last ages), which contains a ‘bag-banishing yeast extract, which depoufs the look of puffs as it brightens the appearance of dark circles…’ (according to Origins). We think it’s great too. You could also try the wonderfully named Puffy the Eye Bag Slayer by Anatomicals, £2.40 for one revitalising – and reusable - gel mask, from Victoria Health.
Her second hero product is Bobbi Brown Tinted Eye Brightener, £21.53 for 7ml, which comes in four shades – light, medium, medium to dark, and dark. It promises to instantly brighten and lift under the eyes, and our tester says it really delivers. According to top make-up artist, Charlotte Tilbury, who also recommends it, the secret is the pink tint, which ‘diffuses any grey or blue tones under my eyes’.
Turning to the underlying causes, getting enough sleep and fresh air is paramount. You may also find that seasonal puffies are due to pollen and spores which affect Sarah badly every spring. The remedies are the same plus a big pair of Jackie O dark glasses, with really wide arms. Do make sure that your cleanser, eye make up remover or indeed any other product you use on your face is not provoking a ‘sad-eyed lady’ reaction. Two colleagues have recently found this happens with a very well-known brand, containing a lot of botanicals – just because an ingredient is natural doesn’t mean it won’t cause a reaction. So try eliminating products one at a time and observing what happens: you may get an instant reaction, or it may develop over hours or even a day.
The other likely cause is a food intolerance, particularly to wheat and/or gluten. If Sarah eats sandwiches one day, the next day you could take her eye bags to the supermarket. So play detective and see if the puffies get worse after you eat certain foods.
We  .
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Tri-Aktiline Instant Deep Wrinkle Filler™, £25.44 for 30ml Jo’s new fave rave: it’s Polyfilla for wrinkles, basically! Based on silicones and ground-breaking optical pigments, it can be applied under or over make-up and tapped into deeper lines and grooves, with a truly astounding line-blurring effect. (If you use it under make-up, allow to ‘set’ before applying foundation.) It’s exclusive to Boots.
WHERE TO FIND PRODUCTS:
Beauty Bible Beauty Clinic - Archive
March 29th, 2009 - Are Sunbeds Safe?
March 22nd, 2009 - Weak, Flaking Nails
March 15th, 2009 - Puffy Eyes
March 8th, 2009 - Camouflaging Red Cheeks
March 1st, 2009 - Hair Colouring in Pregnancy
February 22nd, 2009 - Thinning Eyebrows
February 15th, 2009 - Acne
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