PRODUCT REVIEW: HERBIVORE CLOUD JELLY PLUMPING HYDRATION SERUM - BEST HYALURONIC ACID SERUM, BEST HYDRATING SERUM FOR FACE
HERBIVORE | CLOUD JELLY PLUMPING HYDRATION SERUM
This product review was originally part of my blog article titled, New Hyaluronic Acid Serums I Love from Farmacy Beauty, Herbivore, Glossier and More - Best Hyaluronic Acid Serums, Best Hydrating Serums For Face. You can catch the full piece here.
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One of the most absurd experiences of every New Yorker is riding the subway train on a hot, humid summer day. It can literally be 90 degrees on the subway platform. I’ve taken the subway in Moscow, Hong Kong and Tokyo and believe that all of those cities have air conditioning in their subway stations. Why wouldn’t they? It’s just common sense. There are probably bathrooms in their stations, too. But New York? Nope. Feeling comfortable or somehow cared for in the New York City subway wouldn’t be very New York now would it?
So, I sweat like a marathon runner on the train. Long ago, I began to carry what old-school New Yorkers refer to as a guinea rag in my backpack. “Guinea” being a derogatory term for an Italian-American, a guinea rag is basically a small, gym towel or kitchen rag a guy uses to soak up the sweat on his head.
On those hot days, and we had a few of them this past week, I feel like I sweat out all my body’s water content in an otherwise innocuous 40-minute train ride from Brooklyn to the Bronx.
But there’s a simple remedy for keeping skin hydrated on a hot summer day: a humectant serum.
And I love a good humectant serum! My most recent piece on humectants was right at the beginning of the year in a blog article titled, My Favorite Humectant Serums from Paula's Choice, The Inkey List, Ghost Democracy and More.
MY FAVORITE HUMECTANT SERUMS FROM PAULA'S CHOICE, THE INKEY LIST AND MORE - BEST HYALURONIC ACID SERUMS
Among my favorites featured were the The Ordinary’s Marine Hyaluronics and the Derma-E Ultra Hydrating Alkaline Gel Booster (it’s a mouthful, but worth the experience!). Notably, the Marine Hyaluronics serum from The Ordinary is one of the first two skincare products I use in my day — only minutes after Orpheus and I waken.
A good humectant serum is essential for maintaining skin health on both a hot summer day and during the harsh cold weeks of winter. Among the most effective hydrators (or re-hydrators!) is a well-formulated Hyaluronic Acid serum.
While Hyaluronic Acid is far and away the most popular and most sought-after of humectants, it is by no means the only one. Humectant ingredients that are equally effective at preventing trans-epidermal water loss (TEWL) and subsequent dehydration include: Beta Glucan, Butylene Glycol, Centella Asiatica, Polyglutamic Acid, Glycerin, Aloe Vera, Snow Mushroom and even common seaweed, or algae.
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What Is Trans-epidermal Water Loss?
There’s an excellent article on the health website Skin Better titled, What Is Transepidermal Water Loss and Why Is it Important? available here. In the piece, the author defines TEWL as follows:
“The skin is comprised of three primary layers: the epidermis, the outermost layer; the dermis or middle layer; and the hypodermis, the undermost layer. When water passes from the dermis through the epidermis and evaporates from the skin’s surface, this is known as transepidermal water loss (International Journal of Pharmaceutics).
While TEWL is a process that your skin naturally regulates, certain factors that can damage the skin’s barrier function can also affect TEWL levels. Circumstances such as injury, low-humidity weather conditions and topically applied products that dry out the skin can impact TEWL.
To achieve this, combine humectant and occlusive skincare ingredients.
Transepidermal water loss can contribute to a variety of dry skin conditions, and although it is a natural process, there are ways that you can help your skin stay moisturized and hydrated. Hydration refers to the water content of the skin, whereas moisturization is the skin’s ability to retain those water molecules. Therefore, your skin needs both elements to maintain desirable levels of TEWL.
To achieve this, combine humectant and occlusive skincare ingredients. Humectants help to draw moisture to the epidermis, either from the air if it is humid enough, or from the underlying dermis in low-humidity conditions. Because water content that is drawn from the dermis can be lost through TEWL, it’s important to combine the use of humectants with occlusives. Together, these ingredients create a reservoir of moisture in the epidermis and act as a barrier on the skin to help prevent TEWL by sealing in that moisture. The occlusive agents simultaneously keep pollutants, toxins and harmful bacteria out (Skin Therapy Letter).”
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Maintaining proper hydration levels year-round is essential if skin is going to function at its peak. Healthy functioning skin is better able to defend against external aggressors like pollution, UV, and free radical attacks. And healthy skin is better fortified against aging. So while it may seem slick to say that a humectant serum that helps keep skin hydrated is an effective anti-aging product, it’s not really a stretch at all. It’s simple common sense.
With that, let’s take a look at one of my new humectant serum discoveries for keeping skin optimally hydrated day after day (and especially the really hot ones!).
Herbivore | Cloud Jelly Plumping Hydration Serum
Herbivore is a long-time fave of mine and the brand was among the very first “clean” skincare brands I came across. Hands-down, the Herbivore’s Phoenix Rosehip Anti-Aging Face Oil is one of my cold weather faves. It’s super nourishing and moisturizing — and its star ingredient, Rosehip Oil, is one of the best anti-aging oils in the plethora of non-fragrant plant oils.
And I love the super luxurious, skinlicious Pink Cloud Creamy Jelly Cleanser! Its heavy glass bottle gives it that high-end spa feel. But that doesn’t really count for much. It’s what’s inside that matters. Pink Cloud Jelly Cleanser has a relatively tight ingredient list, four of which are humectants — Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice, Glycerin, Sodium Hyaluronate and Tremella Fuciformis Extract aka Snow Mushroom. More on that in a minute!
PRODUCT REVIEW: HERBIVORE PINK CLOUD JELLY CLEANSER – BEST CLEANSER FOR DEHYDRATED SKIN
So I was excited to try the Herbivore Cloud Jelly Plumping Hydration Serum. It’s a slightly milky, silky serum loaded with rehydrating goodness for the skin. Like the brand’s Pink Cloud Jelly Cleanser, the new Cloud Jelly serum is infused with Snow Mushroom — a sexy sounding hydrator believed to be a more effective humectant than Hyaluronic Acid itself.
Psst…if you’re unfamiliar with Snow Mushroom, it’s a delicacy in Chinese cuisine and apparently makes a delicious soup, though I’ve yet to try it.
What Does Snow Mushroom Do for Skin?
I found a really interesting article on The Zoe Report called, Snow Mushroom Skincare Products Could Replace All Your Hyaluronic Acid Serums. From the article:
Mushrooms are having what’s known as A Moment. The antioxidant-filled fungi are suddenly everywhere: Chaga and cordyceps mushrooms have made their way into adaptogenic smoothie supplements, powdered lion’s mane mushrooms are today’s healthiest alternative to coffee, and reishi mushrooms are the star ingredient in skincare products like Youth to the People’s Adaptogenic Moisture Cream.
But the latest ‘shroom on the block, snow mushroom, is arguably the best yet. With its capacity for locking in moisture, snow mushroom in skincare products is about to replace hyaluronic acid as the gold-standard.
But don’t let the hype fool you; this is hardly a “new” skincare ingredient. “Snow mushrooms, technically known as Tremella fuciformis, are quite the buzz lately,” Dr. Aanand Geria, a dermatologist at Geria Dermatology in New Jersey, tells The Zoe Report. “But ironically, they date back thousands of years and are used frequently in Asian skincare products.”
Recently, the ingredient has made its way into the U.S. mainstream — in products like AVYA Skincare Day Moisturizer and Olay Active Botanicals Intensive Night Cream — for its “tremendous hydrating capabilities,” Geria says. And as most beauty enthusiasts know, hydration is key for fighting everything from acne to aging, not to mention for a next-level glow.
In addition to Snow Mushroom, there are several other humectants, including Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice, Glycerin, and Rose Flower Water.
But perhaps the star active in the Cloud Jelly Plumping Hydration Serum is the vegan collagen at ingredient number seven.
Outside the incestuous world of skincare marketing, vegan collagen is a bit controversial among serious chemists and nutritionists.
Case in point, I was participating in a Clubhouse chat a few weeks ago with three clinical nutritionists and the conversation turned to the absurdity that is vegan collagen.
Their thinking went something like this: since collagen is an animal protein, how can it be vegan? Simply, they were mortified at the very idea of vegan collagen. Their position was that it’s a sales scam made up by skincare marketers to ride the wellness wave and trick consumers into thinking that vegan collagen is a viable substitute for animal collagen and its effects on skin suppleneness and a youthful appearance.
I can’t argue with that. It’s exactly what skincare marketers do. They conjure up all kinds of sexy sounding stories about ingredients to create innovation from nothing. I know because I’ve done that hundreds of times as a beauty copywriter!
Yet, according to WebMD, “Some scientists say that they’re able to genetically modify things like yeast and bacteria to create animal-free “vegan” collagen. Others are working on ways to bio-engineer it. But more research is needed on whether it delivers the same type of results as animal-based collagen products.”
The trio of nutritionists were having none of it!
Beyond its humectant and collagen good-for-skin goodness, Herbivore’s Cloud Jelly Plumping Hydration Serum also contains a slew of cool botanical extracts that help nourish the skin and deliver antioxidant protection; most notably, Vitamin C-rich Strawberry Extract.
It’s a light, clean humectant serum and a pleasure to use. Oh yeah…summer here I come!
SHOP THE BLOG: Purchase the Herbivore Cloud Jelly Plumping Hydration Serum for $48 here.
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The Ingredient List of the Farmacy Beauty Filling Good:
Water/Aqua/Eau, Isoamyl Laurate, 1,2-Hexanediol, Isopentyldiol, Inositol, Glycerin, Inulin, Arginine, Dipalmitoyl Hydroxyproline, Hyaluronic Acid, Sodium Hyaluronate, Thymus Vulgaris (Thyme) Flower/Leaf Extract, Honey Extract, Propolis Extract, Royal Jelly Extract, Sh-Polypeptide-123, Curcuma Longa (Turmeric) Root Extract, Diisostearyl Malate, Maltooligosyl Glucoside, Propanediol, Bis-Diglyceryl Polyacyladipate-1, Hydrogenated Starch Hydrolysate, Glycogen, Ceratonia Siliqua (Carob) Gum, Melia Azadirachta Leaf Extract, Sodium Phytate, Melia Azadirachta Flower Extract, Corallina Officinalis Extract, Cellulose, Fructose, Glucose, Ocimum Basilicum (Basil) Flower/Leaf Extract, Ormenis Multicaulis Oil, Ocimum Sanctum Leaf Extract, Flavor/Aroma, Arachidyl Alcohol, Citrus Aurantium Amara (Bitter Orange) Flower Extract, Behenyl Alcohol, Sclerotium Gum, Arachidyl Glucoside, Cellulose Gum, Cetearyl Alcohol, Lecithin, Limonene, Linalool, Xanthan Gum.
The Ingredient List of the Herbivore Cloud Jelly Plumping Hydration Serum:
so|h, Glycerin 
sii|h 0 0, Hydrolyzed Corn Starch Hydroxyethyl Ether h|vc, Rosa Damascena (Rose) Flower Water, Tremella Fuciformis Sporocarp Extract aox|h, Vegetable Collagen h, Fragaria Vesca (Strawberry) Fruit Extract, Prunus Persica (Peach) Fruit Extract abrasive/scrub|h, Hibiscus Sabdariffa (Hibiscus) Flower Extract, Leuconostoc/Radish Root Ferment Filtrate amic|pres, Microcrystalline Cellulose vc, Sodium Phytate chel, Cellulose Gum vc 0 0, Gluconolactone exf|chel, Glyceryl Caprylate emo|emu, Arginine sii, Caprylhydroxamic Acid chel, Eclipta Prostrata (False Daisy) Extract, Melia Azadirachta (Neem) Leaf Extract, Moringa Oleifera (Moringa) Seed Oil emoThe Ingredient List of the Glossier Super Bounce Hyaluronic Acid + Vitamin B5 Serum:
, Ethylhexyl Palmitate emo|perf 0 2-4, Glycerin sii|h 0 0, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride emo, Propanediol solv|h, Sodium Hyaluronate sii|h 0 0, Panthenol so|h 0 0, Methyl Glucose Sesquistearate emo|emu, Hexylene Glycol solv|emu|perf|surf 0-1 0-2, Xanthan Gum vc, Acrylates/C10-30 Alkyl Acrylate Crosspolymer vc, Disodium EDTA chel|vc, Caprylyl Glycol h|emo, Chlorphenesin pres|amic, Sodium Hydroxide buff
