With PillowtalkDerm, I want to bring a smile into people’s lives through silly PJs, skincare, empowerment,” Dr. Idriss says. “I want to have a brand that’s not just skin deep. My own story is so much deeper than skin. I want to help other people find their own voice and confidence, not just from the outside in but the inside out.
Overlooking Bryant Park, the Midtown Manhattan space, which she ultimately landed on after touring some 40 buildings, is decked out with feel-good touches: an olive tree (a trace of her Lebanese roots) stands front and center; jars of color-coded gum balls are on offer for anyone in need of a pre- or post-treatment sugar fix; playful Gray Malin prints and paintings done by Idriss herself line the walls. The shelves of the inviting waiting room, meanwhile, host art books, skin-care heroes from La Roche-Posay and Jordan Samuel (and eventually Idriss’s own forthcoming line, PillowtalkDerm), and, most notably, a handful of custom-made gifts from a number of her devoted 366,000-plus followers, who tune in for her weekly Instagram Live series.
“I didn’t realize how hungry people were for knowledge,” she tells Fashionista. “I didn’t realize the lack of access people had to information. The landscape’s changing a little bit, but three years ago, I didn’t realize how many people didn’t have the access that I always took for granted because I always lived next to a big city.”
With the help of board-certified dermatologists and cosmetic chemists, we separate retinol fact from fiction to find the best, brightest, and most potent formulas currently on the skin-care market.
Outside of prescriptions and in-office laser procedures, your first line of defense against hyperpigmentation should be one of these dermatologist-approved serums and targeted treatments.
Cosmetic dermatology used to be shrouded in secrecy, but thanks to tell-all celebrities such as the Kardashians and the Gen Z obsession with transparency, for many people there’s no longer any shame in owning up to it.
Juvéderm, Volbella, and Restylane Silk are much thinner, so they are used more superficially and can make the lip look a little bit puffier. For her older patients, Dr. Idriss prefers to use Restylane to reshape and redefine the border or “scaffolding” of the lips that fades over time. And in younger patients with thinner lips, she likes to use Juvéderm Volbella for volume and oomph.
“I think that facial anatomy is so complicated when it comes to structure. There is no miracle product, like in skin care. I don’t think it would be good to have a filler that could address all of your problems, because when you think of the face, you want everything to work a little differently. You want it to be sturdier around the jawline to hold the face up, or along your cheekbones. You want it to be malleable along the cheeks or where you smile, so your face can move. It doesn’t make sense to have a miracle filler, in my mind.”
“People need to be very educated about getting [anti-wrinkle injections] done and should not take it lightly,” said New York dermatologist Dr. Shereene Idriss. She said that while the Instagram advertisements she has seen for Botox have been educational, such posts can make the treatment seem more simple than it is. “[Influencers who are not doctors] are talking about it almost like it’s a haircut,” she said. “Not everybody is a good candidate.”
With many experiencing more breakouts in isolation, the concern around blemishes, and the marks they leave behind, has only grown. If you’re wondering how to
Most of us can self-diagnose a pimple or know when our skin is feeling dry, but what about other skin situations that aren’t as easily
“Pigmentation, pigmentation, pigmentation.” She blames herself saying, “Truthfully, as a kid I used to get a sunburn in order to get some sort of color as both my sisters are shades of caramels and golden tones, whereas I was often compared to a pale chicken.” While light freckles started showing up in her mid twenties, she says it wasn’t under her early thirties and during her pregnancies that her “spots became more evident.”
I called dermatologist Dr. Shereene Idriss to ask if she felt glycerin held up to hyaluronic acid, and she went a step further and said she prefers it — it’s an unsung skincare hero that, she says, is better at increasing skin hydration, minimizing water loss, and protecting the skin from irritation. (Because it’s so conditioning, the ingredient can leave your skin feeling a bit sticky afterward. As someone with ultra dry skin, this has never bothered me — but if you have an oilier skin type it’s something to consider.)
For countless skincare products, niacinamide is touted as a callout ingredient to help fade dark spots and Dr. Idriss credits the ingredient as able to “decrease hyperpigmentation by minimizing the transfer of melanin to keratinocytes.” Those with sensitized skin may prefer niacinamide to others known to cause irritation in some, like vitamin C, hydroquinone, kojic acid or retinoids.
“Retinol is a derivative of vitamin A that helps boost collagen production and aid in cell turnover,” Idriss says. “This results in more even, smoother skin and helps reduce the appearance of sun spots, fine lines, and wrinkles.” It’s because of this rapid cellular turnover that retinol is used in the treatment of acne and has been shown in studies to prevent some cases of skin cancer.
SPF number matters…a lot! On average, SPF 15 offers 94% protection whereas SPF 50 offers 98%. At 94% protection, your skin is still exposed to 6% of UV rays, whereas at 98% protection, only 2% of those rays make it through. That’s nearly a 70% increase in protection! So although a 4% increase in SPF may not seem significant at first, it is in fact a huge amount.
UVB-blocker: Homosalate, in particular, is a UVB-blocker, protecting against the UV damage that is known to cause skin cancer, says Fincher. To that point, “since it has very limited efficacy against UVA rays, it needs to be combined with other agents to ensure complete protection,” adds Idriss. (She also notes that homosalate isn’t particularly photostable and needs to be combined with other ingredients to keep it stable as well.)
Dermatologist Dr. Shereene Idriss says, “This study is not meant to scare anyone or modify behaviors. This study is shedding light on a topic that requires more studies and more data in order to reach an objective, clearly defined conclusion. The sun’s UV rays are a known, well-established, scientifically proven cause of skin cancer.”
