Meet Cohederm, the ingredient hyaluronic acid wishes it was

Hyaluronic acid fans, meet your new favourite skincare ingredient.

Now that you’ve just become confident that you know all there is to know about hyaluronic acid, meet it’s better counterpart, created with seven years of extensive research from Stanford University and skincare brand Avène.

No shade is intended here to hyaluronic acid. HA is wonderful. It’s cheap, it turns skin that looks like a raisin into skin that looks like a grape, it can hold one thousand times it’s own weight in water, plus it’s a humectant. This means that it can pull water to an area and pump it full of moisture, giving you that plump and full, juicy skin. The only issue with hyaluronic acid is that if used alone, in a dry atmosphere, it draws all the moisture to the surface leaving the rest of the skin dehydrated.

This is where Cohederm comes in.

“Cohederm helps restore your skins optimum hydration levels,” says Ita Matthews, National Avène Manager, Ireland. “On contact with the skin it breaks and releases to penetrate the stratum corneum, (aka your outermost layer of skin), allowing better cohesion of epidermal cells which helps to restore the hydrolipidic film, reducing water loss. It also helps to create natural water reservoirs within the skin and allows for on-demand release of hydration. In addition, this allows for a much lighter and more comfortable product and not the heavy, greasy sensation typically associated with dehydrated skincare.”

Cohederm has been added into the formulas of the Avène Hydrance range for long-lasting hydration but as an everyday user of Avène Hydrance Intense Serum, €26, I have a deep love for it. I have, however, been cheating on her with Avène Hydrance Aqua Gel, €30.

It is, as the name suggests, a water gel texture, packed with Avène’s Thermal Spring Water, leaving your skin feel like you’ve been drinking three litres of water a day for your whole life.

It can be worn in a light layer during the day or a thicker layer at night as a sleeping mask that’ll make you wake up looking like you’ve had eight hours sleep, even if you haven’t. It is mega hydrating and soothing, but it has actives too: it contains an antioxidant to protect the skin from free radicals, plus it detoxifies and decongests your skin. The instant effect though, is hyaluronic acid on crack. The gel sinks into your skin, plumping everything up, leaving the skin glossy and wet-looking but not greasy. If dewy, glassy, Glossier skin is your preferred aesthetic, this is exactly what you’ve been looking for, plus it’s the winter wonder product your skin needs.

Avène Hydrance Aqua Gel, €30, is available now in pharmacies nationwide.

Photography by Avène.

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