Dto silicones to formulas that respect the skin and protect the planet. There Modern skincare is sustainable and smart. But it wasn’t always like this. There was a time when cosmetic innovation was measured by the density of a cream and its ability to smooth the skin at the first gesture. And much more. Let’s do a revival, to understand what and how much has really changed.
How has skincare changed in the last 30 years?
It was the mid-nineties when skincare spoke one quasi-engineering grammar: the creams were dense, opaque, full-bodied, they communicated performances by making themselves felt on the skin. The prerogative was a cream capable of leave an instant velvety and soft film which was reminiscent of a ahead of its time optical filterthanks to the diffusion of the scross-linked icons and elastomers.
The leading ingredients in the 90s
Glalpha-hydroxy acids brought the idea of renewal, introducing into common language the exfoliation concept. Attention was growing photoprotection and to UVA rays, whileand retinol began to circulate as an ingredient for connoisseurs, full of authority.
It is also the era in which the stability of vitamin C (oxidation, color, odor) has become a quality criterion perceived and molecules as coenzyme Q10 they translated into cream a “scientific” imagery that suggested study, research, performance.
The claims, “lifting effect!”
Communication also contributed to this story: exorbitant numerical claims, before and after photos sometimes exasperated by primordial photo editing, a vocabulary built on the immediate effect (lifting, tightening, firming, anti-aging) with the promise, often implicit, that the technology was finally being brought to the home an idea of a laboratory, if not even a clinic. Moreover, in those years the regulation was more permissive.
The Nivea, Dior, Chanel and Lancôme skincare campaigns of the 90s (Pinterest)
Only in 2009, with Regulation (EC) 1223/2009, and with its full application in 2013, a new era opens: every cosmetic placed on the European market must follow certain rules and every advertising claim must be justified by concrete and verifiable data.
Today, results count, but not only
Today, thirty years laterinnovation no longer focuses exclusively on the result, but on how it achieves it and with what impact. There sustainability is now a design criterion which led to a profound revision of the formulas, with a strong one regulation of some ingredients for environmental reasons and the abandonment, for example, of plastic microparticles in favor of natural alternatives.
THE sustainability criteria also enter into the assets, more and more often from renewable sources or from waste valorisation processesin packaging (airless, disassembled, reduced), in shorter and more localized supply chains. If in the nineties no one wondered “And then?”, today this question is the starting point.
A new vision of the skin: from the microbiome to biotechnology
The way we look at our skin has also changed. No more surface to be “planed”, but ecosystem to be preserved. The study of microbiome (the set of billions of microorganisms that live permanently on the skin surface) has opened a new season of cosmetics, made of ingredients that communicate with the skin and protect its barrier.
Retinoids, acids and vitamin C continue to be present, but within more controlled formulas, with release systems designed to modulate the action and reduce sensitization phenomena. More and more often these ingredients are accompanied, or in some cases replaced, by more modern and kinder alternatives (but no less effective for this reason) like the enzymatic proteases. In this scenario, biotechnology represents one of the most interesting frontiers.
Processes such as fermentation they allow us to obtain effective active ingredients by reducing the pressure on natural resources and creating bioidentical molecules, increasingly similar to skin physiology such as fospidin with a powerful regenerating action. Today true innovation does not chase the most exotic ingredient but seeks scientific precision and repeatability.
Even sensoriality has been profoundly transformed into lightness, with textures that blend until they almost disappear, becoming one with the skin.
In parallel, skincare explores new frontiers that focus on the link between skin and well-beingsuch as neurocosmetics and psychodermatologydisciplines that investigate the connections between skin, sensoriality and emotional factors.
…to epigenetics
In cosmetic language we speak more and more often, in a figurative sense, of “epigenetic effects”, to describe formulations capable of supporting e optimize physiological functions of the skin, adapting to its rhythms and needs. This is how treatments are born chrono-hydrating and regenerating, characterized by increasingly advanced protection systems against “modern” aggressions such as blue light and pollution.
And the future? Among 30 others, the evolution continues
Looking to the futurecosmetics seems to be oriented towards an increasingly knowledge-based approach protection of the skin organ and on tolerability as a new performance: an idea of skincare that protects, reconstructs and regenerates rather than stimulates.
Concentrated formulas, without water, in stick or modular form, to reduce packaging and transport and improve the stability of some active ingredients.
AND then personalization driven by data and artificial intelligence, bioengineeringbarrier parameters, correlations with lifestyle, in an increasingly close convergence between cosmetics, dermatology and digital. A beauty that understands the complexities of contemporary life, designed for comfort, rituality and reduction of perceived stress, capable of combining effectiveness and sensorial well-being.
