The step where most routines are quietly wrong.
Not because people choose badly, but because they choose once — usually in their thirties — and then keep buying the same weight of product while their skin changes underneath it. Oestrogen supports sebum production, skin thickness and the barrier's ability to hold water. As it declines, all three follow.
Which means a moisturiser that was perfect at thirty-five can feel like it's stopped working at forty-eight. It hasn't. Your skin has changed and the product hasn't moved with it.
If yours feels like it's doing less than it used to, it probably is.
Kate recommends
Chatelier Soft Complexion Night Cream — $205
"Rich, and I mean properly rich — but it melts instead of sitting there, which is the difference between a night cream and a layer of grease. Ninety-three per cent organic content. I wake up comfortable rather than tight, and at my age that's the whole test."
Chloe recommends
Chatelier Crème Défense — $220
"A day cream is doing two jobs for me: hydration, and holding up under SPF and makeup for ten hours. This does both, and it's still working at four in the afternoon. I don't need a rich cream yet. I need one that behaves all day."
