BASIS — Moisturising Day Cream
Three actives. Twenty-nine ingredients in all.
Not sure it's right for your skin? Four questions — Daddy will tell you.
Not every day needs a treatment. Most days need a good cream that goes on fast, disappears, and holds. BASIS is that cream — the plain, essential step the whole routine sits on.
A silky texture that absorbs quickly and hydrates instantly: multi-molecular-weight hyaluronic acid plumps at two depths, soothing bisabolol keeps the skin calm and comfortable, and organic rowanberry, blackberry and watercress bring the antioxidant cover that guards against the day and keeps skin looking younger. It finishes dewy and plump without shine, layers clean under nothing or under everything, and asks for no thought at all. Normal to dry skin, every morning.
The one you reach for without thinking. That's the point.
What it does
- Instant hydration with multi-weight hyaluronic acid
- Soothes and calms with bisabolol
- Antioxidant protection from rowanberry and watercress
- Dewy, plump finish; absorbs fast, no shine
What is in it
- Aloe leaf juice
Used as the water phase rather than as a claim. Hydrating and calming from the first ingredient down.
- Jojoba seed oil
Technically a wax ester, and close enough to skin's own sebum that it absorbs instead of sitting on top. Conditions without the grease.
- Betaine
Sugar-beet humectant. Draws in moisture and takes the edge off surfactants, which is why a wash built on it rinses without that tight, squeaky finish.
- Hyaluronic acid
Humectant; pulls water into the upper layers and holds it there, so skin reads plump rather than merely damp. Used here at multiple molecular weights so it works at more than one depth.
- Bisabolol
The soothing fraction of camomile, isolated. Present so a cream can be actives-forward without turning the skin red.
- Rowanberry extract
Organic rowan fruit. Antioxidant defence against the everyday environmental load — sun, wind, city air.
- Raspberry seed oil
Organic, cold-pressed. Antioxidant, and one of the reasons this finishes dry rather than slick.
How to use
Morning, on clean skin, over serum. A fingertip across face and neck. Layers over COLLAGEN ONE, SURGE or any treatment; add an eye cream and you have a full routine. At night, SOMNUS or REGNUM takes over. In the AURORA and THE RITUAL sets.
Daddy is suspicious of a cream that has to sit on the skin for ten minutes announcing itself. This one goes in and gets on with it, which is the entire point of a day cream. The rule: this is the last step in the morning before sunscreen, and it goes on damp. Not soaking — damp. You are giving the hyaluronic acid something to hold onto. Put it on bone-dry skin in February and it will pull moisture out of you instead, and then you will blame the cream. Small jar. That is not a slight — it is a face cream, not a body lotion, and if you are going through it in three weeks you are using far too much.
