Overnight Performance Cream
Ingredients overview
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Cosme Decorte Overnight Performance CreamIngredients explained
Good old water, aka H2O. The most common skincare ingredient of all. You can usually find it right in the very first spot of the ingredient list, meaning it’s the biggest thing out of all the stuff that makes up the product.
It’s mainly a solvent for ingredients that do not like to dissolve in oils but rather in water.
Once inside the skin, it hydrates, but not from the outside - putting pure water on the skin (hello long baths!) is drying.
One more thing: the water used in cosmetics is purified and deionized (it means that almost all of the mineral ions inside it is removed). Like this, the products can stay more stable over time.
Butylene glycol, or let’s just call it BG, is a multi-tasking colorless, syrupy liquid. It’s a great pick for creating a nice feeling product.
BG’s main job is usually to be a solvent for the other ingredients. Other tasks include helping the product to absorb faster and deeper into the skin (penetration enhancer), making the product spread nicely over the skin (slip agent), and attracting water (humectant) into the skin.
It’s an ingredient whose safety hasn’t been questioned so far by anyone (at least not that we know about). BG is approved by Ecocert and is also used enthusiastically in natural products. BTW, it’s also a food additive.
- A natural moisturizer that’s also in our skin
- A super common, safe, effective and cheap molecule used for more than 50 years
- Not only a simple moisturizer but knows much more: keeps the skin lipids between our skin cells in a healthy (liquid crystal) state, protects against irritation, helps to restore barrier
- Effective from as low as 3% with even more benefits for dry skin at higher concentrations up to 20-40%
- High-glycerin moisturizers are awesome for treating severely dry skin
It seems to us that squalane is in fashion and there is a reason for it. Chemically speaking, it is a saturated (no double bonds) hydrocarbon (a molecule consisting only of carbon and hydrogen), meaning that it's a nice and stable oily liquid with a long shelf life.
It occurs naturally in certain fish and plant oils (e.g. olive), and in the sebum (the oily stuff our skin produces) of the human skin. As f.c. puts it in his awesome blog post, squalane's main things are "emolliency, surface occlusion, and TEWL prevention all with extreme cosmetic elegance". In other words, it's a superb moisturizer that makes your skin nice and smooth, without being heavy or greasy.
Another advantage of squalane is that it is pretty much compatible with all skin types and skin conditions. It is excellent for acne-prone skin and safe to use even if you have fungi-related skin issues, like seborrhea or fungal acne.
The unsaturated (with double bonds) and hence less stable version of Squalane is Squalene, you can read about it here >>
It's the chemically chopped up version of normal lecithin. Most often it's used to create liposomes and to coat and stabilize other ingredients.
Simply alcohol refers to ethanol and it's a pretty controversial ingredient. It has many instant benefits: it's a great solvent, penetration enhancer, creates cosmetically elegant, light formulas, great astringent and antimicrobial. No wonder it's popular in toners and oily skin formulas.
The downside is that it can be very drying if it's in the first few ingredients on an ingredient list.
Some experts even think that regular exposure to alcohol damages skin barrier and causes inflammation though it's a debated opinion. If you wanna know more, we wrote a more detailed explanation about what's the deal with alcohol in skincare products at alcohol denat. (it's also alcohol, but with some additives to make sure no one drinks it).
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
An extremely common multitasker ingredient that gives your skin a nice soft feel (emollient) and gives body to creams and lotions. It also helps to stabilize oil-water mixes (emulsions), though it does not function as an emulsifier in itself. Its typical use level in most cream type formulas is 2-3%.
It’s a so-called fatty alcohol, a mix of cetyl and stearyl alcohol, other two emollient fatty alcohols. Though chemically speaking, it is alcohol (as in, it has an -OH group in its molecule), its properties are totally different from the properties of low molecular weight or drying alcohols such as denat. alcohol. Fatty alcohols have a long oil-soluble (and thus emollient) tail part that makes them absolutely non-drying and non-irritating and are totally ok for the skin.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
A fatty alcohol (the non-drying type with a long oil loving chain of 22 carbon atoms) that is used to increase the viscosity of the formula and it also helps the oily and the watery parts to stay nicely mixed together (called emulsion stabilizing).
Probably the most common silicone of all. It is a polymer (created from repeating subunits) molecule and has different molecular weight and thus different viscosity versions from water-light to thick liquid.
As for skincare, it makes the skin silky smooth, creates a subtle gloss and forms a protective barrier (aka occlusive). Also, works well to fill in fine lines and wrinkles and give skin a plump look (of course that is only temporary, but still, it's nice). There are also scar treatment gels out there using dimethicone as their base ingredient. It helps to soften scars and increase their elasticity.
As for hair care, it is a non-volatile silicone meaning that it stays on the hair rather than evaporates from it and smoothes the hair like no other thing. Depending on your hair type, it can be a bit difficult to wash out and might cause some build-up (btw, this is not true to all silicones, only the non-volatile types).
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
An oil-loving, red-orange colored pigment that is becoming more and more well-known as a potent antioxidant.
If being an orange-colored pigment reminds you of beta-carotene from carrots, that is no coincidence: astaxanthin also belongs to the chemical group called carotenoids known for giving yellow, orange, or red color to plants. Our guy comes mostly from microalgae, a well-known and often used source is Haematococcus Pluvialis.
So Astaxanthin's main thing is being an antioxidant. You can take it as a supplement or slather it on your skin, it works both ways. A mouse skin study from 2012 found that a liposomal Astaxanthin formula prevented UV‐induced skin damage in multiple ways: UV-induced skin thickening, collagen reduction, and melanin formation were all hindered or prevented when the skin was pretreated with the Astaxanthin formula.
Another study from 2012 examined the cosmetic benefits of Astaxanthin and found that combining oral supplementation (6mg/day) and topical application for 8 weeks in 30 volunteers showed improvements in skin wrinkle (crow’s feet), age spot size (cheek), elasticity (crow’s feet), skin texture (cheek) and moisture content of the skin (cheek). If that would not be enough, a 2017 mouse study found our carotenoid molecule to be effective in speeding up wound healing.
Overall, Astaxanthin is an up and coming antioxidant nice to spot on any ingredient list.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
Haematococcus Pluvialis is a microalgae known for being a rich source of powerful, up-and-coming antioxidant, Astaxanthin. The extract comes as a red-colored oily liquid prepared from the resting and astaxanthin accumulating cells of the otherwise green algae.
As an antioxidant, it promises to protect against photodamage and thus help to delay skin photoaging. We have written more about Astaxanthin and its benefits here>>
A pretty famous and better-researched peptide consisting of five amino acids (the building blocks of all proteins). It was created in a joint effort by the French ingredient supplier, Sederma and the cosmetics industry big shot, Procter&Gamble.
The amino acid sequence of the peptide is lysine–threonine–threonine–lysine–serine (KTTKS). Sometimes, it's also called collagen pentapeptide, as it's a subfragment of skin-structure-giving type I collagen. The KTTKS amino sequence is then attached for better oil solubility and skin penetration to palmitic acid and BOOM; we get Palmitoyl Pentapeptide-4.
Though most research is manufacturer sponsored, the clinical studies about Palmitoyl Pentapeptide-4 are promising. In short, it can reduce fine lines, wrinkles and improve skin texture significantly (and at crazy low concentrations, the studies were done with just 3 ppm that is 0.0003%).
There are also studies comparing Palmitoyl Pentapeptide-4 with anti-aging gold standard, retinol. One of them compared 3ppm Pal-KTTKS with 700 ppm (0.07%) retinol and found that they showed similar wrinkle improving ability with the peptide showing better skin tolerability.
Bottom line, if you are into peptides, this is a good one to try.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
Soluble Collagen refers to the big, natural collagen molecules mostly extracted from fish or bovine skin. Spotting collagen on the ingredient list, you might think that, aha, this must be there to supplement the collagen content of our own skin, but you have to know that collagen is a huge-huge molecule that cannot absorb to the middle layer of the skin where collagen is and even if it could, it cannot just magically go the right places to become part of the skin's own collagen network. Putting collagen on your skin for anti-aging purposes is like throwing tent poles onto a ramshackle tent and expecting the tent to magically become nice and firm again.
The strong point of collagen is being a large molecule with tremendous water binding capacity, i.e. an amazing humectant and moisturizer. It produces a water-rich film on the skin giving the stratum corneum (the uppermost layer of the skin) great hydration, making it nice and smooth and reducing trans-epidermal-water loss (the process of water evaporating out of your skin).
It is also so gentle and non-irritant that it can actually be used in cleansers to reduce the irritating potential of harsh surfactants, aka cleansing agents.
If you are fine with animal-derived ingredients and know that collagen in a jar has nothing to do with wrinkles but everything to do with skin hydration, Soluble Collagen is a nice ingredient.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
- Primary fat-soluble antioxidant in our skin
- Significant photoprotection against UVB rays
- Vit C + Vit E work in synergy and provide great photoprotection
- Has emollient properties
- Easy to formulate, stable and relatively inexpensive
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
A large sugar molecule (aka polysaccharide) that's used as a gelling agent and comes from brown seaweed.
Combined with calcium salts, it forms a rigid gel used in "rubber masks".
A super common emollient that makes your skin feel nice and smooth. It comes from coconut oil and glycerin, it’s light-textured, clear, odorless and non-greasy. It’s a nice ingredient that just feels good on the skin, is super well tolerated by every skin type and easy to formulate with. No wonder it’s popular.
A big molecule created from repeated subunits (a polymer of acrylic acid) that magically converts a liquid into a nice gel formula. It usually has to be neutralized with a base (such as sodium hydroxide) for the thickening to occur and it creates viscous, clear gels that also feel nice and non-tacky on the skin. No wonder, it is a very popular and common ingredient. Typically used at 1% or less in most formulations.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
We don't have description for this ingredient yet.
A synthetic liquid oil that can replace mineral oil or silicone oils in the cosmetic formulas. There are different grades depending on the molecular weight ranging from very light, volatile, non-residue leaving ones to more substantial, slight residue leaving ones.
Apart from leaving the skin soft and smooth (emollient), it's also used as a waterproofing agent in sunscreens or makeup products and as a shine enhancer in lip gloss formulas.
A light, velvety, unique skin feel liquid that is a good solvent and also makes the skin feel nice and smooth (aka emollient). It's often used in makeup products mixed with silicones to give shine and slip to the product. It's also great for cleansing dirt and oil from the skin as well as for taking off make-up.
A clear, slightly yellow, odorless oil that's a very common, medium-spreading emollient. It makes the skin feel nice and smooth and works in a wide range of formulas.
It's a common little helper ingredient that helps water and oil to mix together. Also, it can help to increase the solubility of some other ingredients in the formula.
A common little helper ingredient that helps water and oil to mix together, aka emulsifier.
The number at the end refers to the oil-loving part and the bigger the number the more emulsifying power it has. 20 is a weak emulsifier, rather called solubilizer used commonly in toners while 60 and 80 are more common in serums and creams.
A copolymer is a big molecule that consists not of one but of two repeating subunits. This particular copolymer is a handy helper ingredient to form nice gel textures.
It usually comes to the formula combined with emollients (such as C13-14 Isoparaffin, Isohexadecane, Isononyl Isononanoate or Squalane) and can be used as an emulsifier and/or thickener to produce milky gel emulsions with a soft and non-tacky skin feel.
The unfancy name for it is lye. It’s a solid white stuff that’s very alkaline and used in small amounts to adjust the pH of the product and make it just right.
For example, in case of AHA or BHA exfoliants, the right pH is super-duper important, and pH adjusters like sodium hydroxide are needed.
BTW, lye is not something new. It was already used by ancient Egyptians to help oil and fat magically turn into something else. Can you guess what? Yes, it’s soap. It still often shows up in the ingredient list of soaps and other cleansers.
Sodium hydroxide in itself is a potent skin irritant, but once it's reacted (as it is usually in skin care products, like exfoliants) it is totally harmless.
A mild cleansing agent that's used mainly next to other cleansing agents (co-surfactant) to improve foam density and regulate viscosity.
A mainly oil-loving, vegetable raw material based ingredient that helps water and oil to mix together, aka emulsifier. It can also function as a wetting and dispersing agent helping insoluble particles such as color pigments or inorganic sunscreens (zinc/titanium dioxide) to disperse nice and even in liquids.
Chemically speaking, it comes from the attachment of sorbitan (a dehydrated sorbitol (sugar) molecule) with the unsaturated fatty acid Oleic Acid, that creates a partly water (the sorbitan part) and partly oil soluble (oleic part) molecule.
It’s pretty much the current IT-preservative. It’s safe and gentle, but even more importantly, it’s not a feared-by-everyone-mostly-without-scientific-reason paraben.
It’s not something new: it was introduced around 1950 and today it can be used up to 1% worldwide. It can be found in nature - in green tea - but the version used in cosmetics is synthetic.
Other than having a good safety profile and being quite gentle to the skin it has some other advantages too. It can be used in many types of formulations as it has great thermal stability (can be heated up to 85°C) and works on a wide range of pH levels (ph 3-10).
It’s often used together with ethylhexylglycerin as it nicely improves the preservative activity of phenoxyethanol.
Exactly what it sounds: nice smelling stuff put into cosmetic products so that the end product also smells nice. Fragrance in the US and parfum in the EU is a generic term on the ingredient list that is made up of 30 to 50 chemicals on average (but it can have as much as 200 components!).
If you are someone who likes to know what you put on your face then fragrance is not your best friend - there's no way to know what’s really in it.
Also, if your skin is sensitive, fragrance is again not your best friend. It’s the number one cause of contact allergy to cosmetics. It’s definitely a smart thing to avoid with sensitive skin (and fragrance of any type - natural is just as allergic as synthetic, if not worse!).
The caramel in cosmetics is pretty much the same one that you know from the kitchen. It is derived by controlled heat treatment of food-grade carbohydrates (sugars) and works as a brown colorant.
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| what‑it‑does | solvent |
| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant | solvent |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient | moisturizer/humectant |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
| what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient | emollient |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | emollient |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | emulsifying |
| what‑it‑does | antimicrobial/antibacterial | solvent | viscosity controlling |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | viscosity controlling | emulsifying | surfactant/cleansing |
| irritancy, com. | 1, 2 |
| what‑it‑does | emollient |
| what‑it‑does | emollient |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | viscosity controlling |
| what‑it‑does | emollient |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | perfuming |
| what‑it‑does | antioxidant |
| what‑it‑does | antioxidant |
| what‑it‑does | cell-communicating ingredient |
| what‑it‑does | emollient |
| what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant |
| what‑it‑does | antioxidant |
| what‑it‑does | antioxidant |
| irritancy, com. | 0-3, 0-3 |
| what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
| irritancy, com. | 4, 4 |
| what‑it‑does | emollient |
| what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | surfactant/cleansing |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | emulsifying | viscosity controlling |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | viscosity controlling |
| irritancy, com. | 2, 1 |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | solvent |
| what‑it‑does | emollient | perfuming |
| what‑it‑does | emulsifying | surfactant/cleansing |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
| what‑it‑does | emulsifying | surfactant/cleansing |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
| what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
| what‑it‑does | buffering |
| what‑it‑does | surfactant/cleansing |
| what‑it‑does | emulsifying |
| irritancy, com. | 0, 3 |
| what‑it‑does | buffering |
| what‑it‑does | preservative |
| what‑it‑does | perfuming |
| what‑it‑does | colorant |