Tonight, we are getting basted together, minus the alcohol. 

What is face basting? Face basting was born from lip basting. It was around Thanksgiving, and all I could think about was juicy turkeys, and I wanted to figure out a way to turn my lips into juicy turkeys. And lip basting was born. 

At the same time, everybody was slugging, where they would put Vaseline all over their faces and look like grease balls in the process. There is some benefit to slugging because it creates an occlusive layer on your skin, but I always thought that the benefit fell short because you weren't actively trying to reduce inflammation for an inflamed skin barrier. So I thought to myself, how can face slugging be such a hit when it's only doing one thing? And that's when face basting was born, because the answer was in front of me… in the form of a blowout diaper. 

We were using a lot of diaper rash cream on my son’s skin, and his skin was doing pretty damn well. And it hit me—barrier cream is pretty much like Vaseline, but there's usually the addition of zinc to it because zinc offers a lot of added benefits to your skin. 

Let's talk about zinc — benefits & types. 

There's several different types of zinc, but we're going to kind of keep it to two —zinc oxide and zinc gluconate. 

1. Zinc oxide is what we find in diaper rash cream. It has anti-inflammatory properties that can help minimize the look of redness, swelling, and irritation. So if you have eczema, atopic dermatitis, irritations, etc, zinc oxide can help calm your skin down. Zinc oxide is also in sunscreen because it has sun-protective benefits (side note: I would never substitute a diaper cream for a sunscreen because it's not a hack for a sunscreen—it hasn't been tested in that capacity). That's why mineral sunscreens with zinc oxide are better suited for people with sensitive skin because of the anti-inflammatory benefits.

2. While zinc gluconate also has anti-inflammatory benefits, the main benefit is its antibacterial properties. So if you're somebody who is very acne-prone with dry skin, using something with zinc gluconate would be better for your skin. But is zinc gluconate better than zinc oxide for anti-inflammatory properties? Probably not. 

So if you're super dry, inflamed, and irritated, you want to use something with zinc oxide. If you're dry but acne-prone, you want to use something with zinc gluconate.

IN A NUTSHELL: 

[ Face Basting = Occlusive Layer + Added Benefit with Zinc

→ Dry, inflamed and irritated skin → Zinc Oxide

→ Dry and acne prone skin → Zinc Gluconate ]

 

So how do you face baste? 

Watch this video where Dr. Idriss breaks down face basting and product recommendations.