Many people consider doing facial at home to save money. Which is very true – by doing your own facial you will be able to save lots of dollars.
I am doing my own facials for other additional reasons: First, I am too lazy to go anywhere. Well, lazy, tired and busy. I often feel so drained after my day job that I just want to go home. And during weekends I have many family obligations, so I hardly find time to go to a spa.
Second, I honestly think that there are so many good skin care products on the market with potent ingredients, that I can basically have a facial at home whenever I want to. And I do not have to wait for an appointment.
I personally reserve a visit to a cosmetologist when I want some invasive procedures like botox, fillers or mesotherapy to be done on my face. Everything else I can do at home at my convenience.
Also, I really like taking care of my skin. It became a true hobby and a huge part of my own self-care, so I enjoy doing all the care myself.
In any event, whatever your reason is for having a diy facial, follow these facial treatment steps and you will end up with beautiful glowing skin.
What is facial and why to do it?
Facial is basically a thorough face clean up that is followed by extensive hydration and nourishment.
Facial includes a series of skin care treatments for face that will take care of your skin on a deep level.
As a result, your skin will appear healthier and younger.
Tips on doing facial for face at home
- Know your products. This is an important step, because you do not really want to use a product that will cause irritation or breakouts. If you bought something new, always perform a skin patch test before applying the product to whole face.
- Use lukewarm water during your facial. I know that there are many resources that say to use ice cold water, but in fact it is damaging to your skin. Also, hot water could be very irritating and drying.
- Perform in home facial once a week. However, if during the week you feel that your skin needs more hydration or exfoliation – do not wait for your “facial day”, do what your skin needs.
- Allocate about 1 hour for your facial. If you can not dedicate the whole hour, the do not worry. There are some steps that you can do while still performing your home chores. For example, I hardly sit still or lye down when doing a face mask. I put a mask on and do something around the house (like emptying a dishwasher, or cleaning my bathroom). In fact, I am writing this post and wearing a sheet mask on my face (and before that I did some mild exfoliation).
- It is better to perform your facial before the bedtime. This way if you happened to have some mild irritation or redness due to extensive treatments, your skin will have the whole night to recover.
Let’s explore steps for a facial at home.
(This post contains affiliate links. That means that if you make a purchase, I might receive a small commission at no extra cost to you).
1. Know your skin type
This might sound like a very unusual step to you and you probably did not expect to see it here (and you probably did not read about it in other resources).
However, knowing your skin type is extremely crucial for your skin care including a spa treatment at home.
You need to know your skin type to determine, which products to use, which products to avoid. If your skin is sensitive, then using products that are meant for oily skin, might damage and irritate your skin.
If you do not know your skin type – no worries. Please, follow this LINK and read and extensive post on how to determine your skin type. You can also sign up to receive FREE ebook which goes into deeper details on how to find your skin type and how to establish your skin care routine.
2. Remove all your makeup
If you are doing your facial after a busy tiring day, you need to remove your makeup to proceed with other steps.
Use your gentle make up remover or botanical oil (jojoba, almond, grapeseeds oil and etc).
Dab a cotton pad with a product and apply to your face using gentle strokes. Try to avoid pulling and tagging your skin, especially around your eyes.
I apply a cotton pad with a product to my eyes and let product soak to the makeup for about 10 seconds. Then I gently wipe everything out.
I find that soaking makeup first makes it removal so much easier.
I like using micellar water to remove my makeup. And I always follow my make up removal with double cleansing.
3. Cleanse your skin
You need to remove makeup “leftovers” as well as other skin impurities: dead cells, dust, oil, environmental pollution and so on. You cannot really apply any products to dirty skin. It will actually cause more problems such as breakouts. So, through face clean up at home is a must.
I will always advocate for double-cleansing method especially in the evening. If you are doing your facial in the morning, you can wash your face with non-foam cleanser only.
To read more about double-cleansing, please, follow THIS link.
4. Exfoliate your skin
This is a step you have to be careful about.
What does exfoliation do? Exfoliation further removes dead layers of the cells, that collects on the surface of your skin. If this layer is too thick, you will get dull tone, clogged pores, acne and even redness and irritation.
Also removing dead cells your are allowing the following products to penetrate deeper and deliver more beneficial ingredients to your skin.
So, you would want to remove this layer. However, you do not want to overdo it because, you are risking removing natural protective lipid layer of the skin. This lipid layer moisturizes your skin and does not let your skin become dehydrated (it keeps moisture in the cells).
If you use harsh exfoliators and scrubs your are risking stripping off that protective lipid layer of the skin.
I strongly believe, that no scrubs should used on the face. Scrubs usually contain some sorts of fine particles (grinned coffee beans, grinned seeds, or even grinned stones). And though those particles claim to be “fine” and “delicate” they are indeed to harmful for the skin.
I love peeling gels. I find them to be a very mild exfoliator that does not damage protective skin barrier.
I also consider clay masks to be a very mild form of exfoliation. Clay masks will “go” into your pores pulling out dirt and stuck sebum. They will also remove skin debris. The biggest thing with clay masks is not to have them on for more than 5, ok, maybe 7 minutes. If you keep them on longer (meaning a mask became completely dry), then they start working against you. So, do not keep them on for more than 7 minutes.
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5. Warm up your skin
You will find on almost every blog the recommendation to steam your skin after cleansing it. I cannot agree with it and strongly suggest that you do not steam your face.
Let’s explore.
Water boils when it reaches 100 degrees C (212 F) and steam develops. Steam can get much hotter than 100 degrees. So when you steam your face you are exposing your skin to quite high temperatures.
I know many people would argue, that you do not really place your face right into the centre of the boiling point (it would be impossible anyways as it is too hot). Rather you place your face to the very edge of the steam, kind catching steam’s last breath (let’s be poetic a bit lol).
However, steam is steam and it is hot. And it is not good for your skin.
I suggest that you soak your hand towel in hot (not boiling hot) water, squeeze extra water out and apply this warm towel to your face for a minute. Do it couple of times. You will feel that your skin surface will soften.
Many people like saying that steaming your skin will “open up the pores”. It is not true, you cannot really open or shrink pores as skin pores to do not have muscles and there is nothing to open or close them with.
So why would we still want to do this step and kind of “steam” the face? We do it because we would like to soften dirt and impurities stuck in the pores so we can easily remove them in our next steps.
6. Peeling
You do peeling for a variety of reasons. One of them is that you would want to remove a very thin layer of your surface skin.
That will boost cells regeneration: cells will be forced to reproduce at the faster rate. That will improve texture of your skin, minimize wrinkles (especially fine lines), brighten up age and sun spots.
At the salon an aesthetician will use a very strong peel and that is fine. Aestheticians are professionals and know what they are doing.
At home you would want to use less potent product that is safe to use by unprofessionals.
I honestly skip this step very often and would do peeling once a month or even more rare.
The reason is, that I believe, that if you take care of your skin ON A REGULAR BASIS (meaning daily), then you won’t need a peel. Your skin will be perfect without a peel.
So, if you have a sensitive skin or just do not feel like peeling off some skin layers, you can easily skin this step.
7. Tone your skin with a toner
You would usually use a toner right after cleansing. Toners remove excessive dirt that hid from cleansers. They also prepare our skin for the following skin care products.
Please, read my extensive post on what toners are, why and how to use them HERE.
You can also make your own toners at home. Follow this LINK to read recipes of DIY toners.
When you are doing facial at home, I suggest you apply toner at this step. Choose calming and regenerating toner. You would want to calm, hydrate and nourish skin that just has been thoroughly cleansed and exfoliated.
8. Apply a face mask
By now you removed all impurities, debris, dirt and dead cells. Your skin is ready to receive hydrating and nourishing products.
I love masks and try to do a face sheet mask almost every day. I have a very good post about all types of face masks and how to use them. Please, follow THIS post to read about it.
Simply speaking effect of the mask depends on what type of the mask you choose. And you should choose the mask based on what kind of skin issue you are targeting. Is it hydration and moisture? Is it nourishment? Are you looking for anti-aging mask and masks with lifting effect?
Skin whitening and brightening? You can pick a whitening mask so you can have a whitening facial at home.
So pick your mask according to your skin needs and pamper yourself.
If you are looking into making your own masks, please, browse my HOMEMADE SKIN CARE section of the blog. You will find many recipes of homemade masks.
9. Treat your lips, eye and neck
It is a very big surprise for some people (including me), that skin under our eyes, on the neck and lips is similar in texture and composition. It has less oily glands meaning that it is not as moisturized as the rest of the face.
Also skin in these areas is thiner and more delicate.
It is also used the most during our speech, emotions and movements.
I also have extensive posts on how to care for the skin around your eyes, please follow THIS link.
And read more about neck care because there are some unique tricks that should be done to keep our neck wrinkle free. Please follow THIS link here.
I use the same products for eyes on my lips and do see a very good improvement.
10. Moisturize your skin
This is the time for moisturizing and hydrating serums/essences, ampoules.
Serums/essences and ampoules are loaded with concentrated ingredients which will deliver moisture and hydration to your skin. They are a step up from the toner.
Choose the product based on your skin needs and issues you would like to target. For my mature oily skin I always choose product that promises me hydration and has anti-aging ingredients.
11. Apply a moisturizer and/or moisturizing cream
I learned to “listen” to my skin and can feel when it needs an extra product. So sometimes I would use both moisturizer and moisturizing cream or I just stop at one of them.
However, after such intensive facial I often end up sing both products just to boost up hydration and nourishment of my skin.
12. Overnight sleeping mask (optional, can be used instead of step 11)
This step is mostly for people with very, very dry and dehydrated skin. I read that some people’s skin is so dry, that they apply an overnight sleeping mask on top of their night cream.
I do not really recommend doing that unless you really have to (again, listen to your skin).
Overnight sleeping mask is not your usual night cream. Night cream is designed to be used daily, whereas sleeping mask should be used 1-2 times a week. Overnight mask contains a high amount of concentrated ingredients. Their purpose is to provide your skin with a boost of “goodies”. Please, read more about overnight masks HERE.
And now you are done with your cleansing facial at home. Well, not just cleansing, but also hydrating, moisturizing and nourishing. I know you might feel very overwhelmed by just reading all these steps. However, it is not that scary and hard. It is easier to do all theses step than to read them. And once you get a hang of it, you will realize how easy all those steps are.
Do not hesitate to skip steps if you need to. You do not really have to do them all every week. Skin care is fun so let’s make it fun as well as enjoyable.
Stay beautiful!!!!!!!!