Cold Skincare: Do They Really Work for the Skin?

September 8, 2019

In the growing skincare world, the emphasis on using cold is interestingly more and more relevant. That’s why we see things like skincare refrigerators, ice rooms, saunas, cryotherapy treatments and beauty tools such as jade rollers used on a daily basis. While they sound like passing fads, we can’t help but wonder: is there really some merit to cold beauty?

Minimizing Pore Size

In order to shrink or expand something, your body requires muscles to go through the motion. When you take a look underneath the surface of our skin, our pores go through thermal expansion. This means that your skin will expand when hot and contract when it’s cold. Besides our pores, our skin can show this constant change of heat and cold in many other ways. Our bodies can undergo inflammation and sweat as we heat up. And in the cold, our bodies shiver to generate heat and keep them functioning.

Skincare Tips

Knowing more about all the cool tidbits about our skincare and lifestyle in general, we can start to understand more about why we’re always seeing people toss their face masks and skincare products in the refrigerator or own mini skincare fridges to cool their products.

Is There a Method to the Madness?

Having large pores most likely causes clogged pores which causes acne. When you use a face mask out of the fridge or a jade roller on top, you’re using the cold temperature from the product’s surface to cool down inflammation and swelling in the skin. This is especially important for anyone with oily and acne prone skin because they are both caused by inflammation in the body.

Secret to Calming Inflammation

Did you know that the back of your neck is the area where it’s most sensitive to temperature changes? When you apply a cold compress against the back of your neck, you can help cool down your body temperature. Make sure you’re not applying ice cubes or ice packs directly onto your skin!

But why stop right there? While you apply the compress (for around 20 minutes), the cold temperature will help your skin to absorb any skincare products into the deeper layers of the skin. At this time, you can even apply a hydrating serum or moisturizer to amp up its effects.

Cooling Your Skincare Products

Here comes the question: can cooling your skincare products in the fridge help the product’s efficacy?

When we normally apply our skincare products and serums, we’re constantly exposing them to outside factors. Every time we open a tub of moisturizer or serum, we’re actually exposing them to air, sunlight, temperature, and bacteria even if it’s for a short time. This can lead to oxidation, which then affects the product’s efficacy over time. On the other hand, when you place your skincare products in the fridge, the cool temperature helps to preserve the active ingredients for a longer period of time. The temperature also helps to inhibit bacterial and fungal growth in the chance that the product becomes contaminated by your fingers.

What Types of Products can You Place in the Fridge?

As we mentioned earlier, storing away any product containing active ingredients into the fridge can help it work best in cooler temperatures. Water based serums, gels and lotions, vitamin C serums, retinols, retinoids, and face masks (excluding clay) are found to show many benefits when exposed to cold temperatures.

Is it Necessary to Invest in a Skincare Refrigerator?

It depends because it’s more of a personal choice rather than a necessity. But that’s not to say there is some merit to using skincare refrigerators to store your skincare products. After all, they seem to work pretty well for products containing active ingredients that normally should be kept away from direct sunlight and heat. If you find that your skincare routine includes many products containing active ingredients, you can try investing in a skincare fridge. Or you know, you can try placing your products in your usual fridge too.