How to Make Your Hands Look Pretty and Young

Baby the rest of your body all you want, but neglect your hands, and they’re bound to tell some serious tales about your age. From sun spots to wrinkles, hands have a way of aging you by leaps and bounds if you let them. To keep your hands looking young and smooth, move beyond that little tube of hand cream in your medicine cabinet and give those digits a daily dose of undivided attention. Show them some love, and they’ll show the world a younger, prettier you.

Things You'll Need

• Sloughing cream
• Topical retinoid
• Waterproof gloves
• Glycerin-based moisturizer
• Cotton gloves
• Red nail polish

Instructions

1. Exfoliate your hands with a sloughing cream. Similar to a scrub but less abrasive, a sloughing cream gently removes the top layer of dead, dry skin, revealing fresher looking skin below the surface. Look for a sloughing cream made with glycolic acid and gently rub it in a circular motion into your hands. To avoid inflaming or drying out the skin, do not exfoliate more than once a week.

2. Reverse the signs of aging and sun damage with prescription-strength retinoids. Derived from Vitamin A, retinoids do more than gloss over dryness and other skin imperfections: they actually rejuvenate skin by minimizing lines and accelerating cell turnover. While retinoids are available in several different strengths and can be tailored to address your individual needs, they can also cause irritation, so talk to your doctor to determine whether they are right for you.

3. Wear gloves. Harsh soaps, excessive hand washing and household chemicals can wash away the protective lipids that keep hands looking youthful. You can guard against this damage by donning waterproof gloves when you do your cleaning.

4. Give your hands a deep moisturizing treatment. Before bed, apply a glycerin-based moisturizing cream to damp hands and then slip on a pair of cotton gloves. The cotton gloves allow the cream to absorb into your skin instead of wiping off on your sheets, making your hands appear noticeably smoother and more hydrated.

5. Skip barely-there neutrals and pleasing pastels and paint your nails a vivid red. Red doesn't draw attention to you -- it draws attention to itself, making it the best color to camouflage your hands' imperfections.

6. Turn back the clock with laser treatments. Lasers use a high intensity beam of light to injure the skin, causing a bump in collagen that will smooth and firm the skin on your hands. Depending on the type of laser your doctor uses and the extent of your treatment, lasers can be painful and costly, and may require multiple treatments to repair sun damaged skin. Talk to your dermatologist to discuss whether laser treatments might be right for you.

Tips & Warnings

• At the first sign of age spots, pick up a tube of hydroquinone cream from your drugstore. The cream works by breaking down pigment in your skin, causing areas of hyperpigmentation to fade.

• Do not leave the house without applying sunscreen to your hands. Not only can the sun wreak havoc on your hands, causing wrinkles, sun spots and other signs of premature aging, but exfoliating, topical retinoids and laser treatments all leave the hands especially vulnerable to sun damage.

References

• Good Housekeeping: Found: Younger Looking Hands
• Allure: The Nail Polish That Makes Hands Look Younger
• Dermalogica: Your Skin: Exfoliation – How Much Is Too Much?
• O, The Oprah Magazine: The Skin Fixers: 6 Dermatologists Prescribe Solutions to Your Complexion Concerns