Meet Lixirskin, the Skincare Brand Doing Things Differently
We talk skin care routines and beauty confidence with LIXIRSKIN’s chic founder
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Colette Haydon’s Youth Dew
We talk skin care routines and beauty confidence with LIXIRSKIN’s chic founder
Shop LIXIRSKINBy: Team Liberty
Meet doctor in dermo-pharmacology, beauty chef and fabulous Frenchwoman Colette Haydon. She moved to London in 1984 to create skin products for REN and Jo Malone, among others, and in October 2017 launched LIXIRSKIN. If you haven’t got any of the range in your bathroom yet, it’s only a matter of time before its squidgy, millennial-pink tubes find their way into your life.
Talk us through where you are today...
We are in my lab, which looks like a kitchen because it is a kitchen. I work more like a cook than a pharmacist. I specialise in skin care. My passion is formulation. First, I make tiny amounts, gently heating ingredients in my bain-marie before using my Silverson machine [a homogeniser], which reproduces the movement that will happen at the factory.
What’s the philosophy of LIXIRSKIN?
There is no such thing as a product that is good for one part of your skin and not the other. A good formula does it all. So ta-da! LIXIRSKIN is about my belief in universal, multitasking, everyday products. My Universal Emulsion is very light, yet seals the skin – it’s something you can use for the face, neck, décolleté, arms and hands.
Who is LIXIRSKIN for?
Being “old” [Haydon is in her sixties], people expected me to do a brand for older women, but I’ve done a brand totally loved by the young. It’s the thing I am most proud of.
"There is no such thing as a product that is good for one part of your skin and not the other. A good formula does it all. "
Vitamin C Paste is already a beauty essential...
The active ingredient is L-ascorbic acid at 10%, and it is not a good idea to leave an acid on your face all day. My Vitamin C Paste is applied in the morning, then splash a little water, leave it for a few minutes and rinse.
You’ve talked about vitamin C reducing “urban grey” – what’s that?
Pollution oxidises the sebum and proteins in the skin to create a greyish undertone that I call urban grey. The Vitamin C Paste reduces that extremely quickly.
So Vitamin C Paste in the morning, then Universal Emulsion as a moisturiser. What about at night?
If all fails, and it is going to fail, you need to banish the nasties at the end of the day with my Electrogel Cleanser, which pulls the positively charged toxins from the skin for an extra-deep clean.
And the packaging?
I love tubes, but only if they lie down. I’ve made mine shiny, soft and squidgy, easy to throw around. Not too precious. You buy a big one for home, a small one for your handbag.
What is your attitude to ageing?
One night you go to bed and decide you will wake up beautiful. That’s what I did – I woke up beautiful. I think I am beautiful. I ask people, “Am I beautiful?” No one has contradicted me yet.
