Breakouts, Miracle Masks and Pollution – Notes of a Skincare Junkie in New York
As I write this, I’ve just arrived in Seattle to visit family after an epic weekend in New York. While I’ve been to many cities, few have impressed me quite like New York City and I think that’s mainly down to its tireless buzz and otherworldliness which is inevitable in a melting pot like this. There’s just something about being in a new setting that makes you all the more confident – and less stalker-seeming – to approach strangers, and so I’ll never forget the wonderful people I met, including the Frank Sinatra lookalike who serenaded me with The Girl From Ipanema while I ate cannolis in Little Italy and the guy from Queens selling tickets in Times Square. FYI, I won’t pretend that late night shopping trips to Duane Reade have nothing to do with my love for the city – where else can you stock up on pretzel M&M’s whilst perusing the beauty aisle?
With that being said, a city like New York does come with its drawbacks – filthy subway stations, mind-numbing traffic, the odd impatient driver and pollution, the latter of which earns the focus of my post today.
Within a day of arriving in New York, the pollution had already left its mark on my skin. Imagine red, irritated eyes and a sizable mountain on my chin. With nothing to treat the zit – due to forgetting to pack my beloved Origins Super Spot Remover Gel hand-luggage restrictions – a relative I was visiting suggested I try her Glamglow. Though I’m aware of the immense hype this mask has received, I’d yet to experience the results until that day, and considering what it’s done for my skin I regret not succumbing to it much sooner.
In a mere 10 minutes the mask undid a day of damage and left my skin looking clear, clean and clarified, and topping it off with an exfoliating toner like Pixi’s Glow Tonic only made things better. I also deserve brownie points for turning to Skinceuticals’ Serum 10*, a major 🔑 to repairing and protecting skin against the elements in pollution-riddled cities like New York.
A weekend is hardly enough time to take in a city as great as New York, and though I visited the usual haunts i.e. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Times Square and Dumbo, I plan to return equipped with the tools to beat pollution so I can check out MoCADA and maybe the Statue of Liberty in peace. I also have a few beauty destinations in mind like Keihl’s in Hell’s Kitchen and Harlem’s latest beauty retail experience, Vivrant Beauty… but in the meantime tell me, are there any other beauty destinations worth visiting in NYC?
