A Skincare Routine for Men Over 40 (From a Guy Who Just Started One)

I'm Todd. I'm 55, I've lived in Northville since 2003, and until about a year ago my entire skincare routine was a bar of Irish Spring in the shower. My daughter Kendal — an esthetician at Skin Experts here in town — has been trying to move me off that plan for years.

I finally listened. What follows is the routine she built for me, in the order she added things, with the reasoning behind each step. If you're a guy over 40 who's never really done this, start here.

This was the biggest single change. Bar soap is formulated for the pH of your body, not your face. On facial skin, it strips the barrier and leaves you with the tight, slightly itchy feeling most men my age have just accepted as normal.

Swap it for a gentle, non-foaming face cleanser. Once a day, at night, in the shower. Two seconds of extra effort.

I resisted this one. It sounded fussy. It is not fussy. It's ten seconds after you towel off, and by week three my forehead stopped flaking in the middle of the day.

One bottle, both times of day, applied while my face is still slightly damp. That's it.

The one Kendal put me on feels like a light lotion, not the chalky white stuff I remembered from Little League. I wear it over my moisturizer, under the ballcap, whether I'm mowing the lawn or driving to a meeting.

The reason: most of what looks like 'aging' on a guy's face — the leathery texture, the uneven tone across the cheekbones — is cumulative sun damage. It's the single easiest thing to prevent from here forward.

I was skeptical. I've now had a few facials from Kendal, including a back facial, and I can report: it is not a spa gimmick. A trained esthetician can clean out congestion I couldn't get to on my own, and afterward my skin behaves differently for weeks.

For guys who spend time outdoors in Michigan — golf, yardwork, boats, snow — a facial once a season is a reasonable investment in the largest organ in your body.

No serums, no retinol, no eye cream, no rollers. Kendal's rule for me: nail the three basics for three months, then we'll add one thing if I want to. I don't yet. It turns out doing very little, consistently, is doing a lot.