The Ordinary New Launch
Wake Up Your Skin with The Ordinary's new launch-featuring Caffeine and Escin to hydrate, tone and tighten tired-looking skin.
According to a 2024 Mintel study, many U.S. consumers are now linking changes in their skin to everyday realities: 35% point to lack of sleep, and 46% cite increased stress. The connection between stress and skin health has been well established, but as research shows, prolonged sleep loss can heighten the body's stress response, weakening collagen fibres, slowing skin repair, and speeding up skin aging. Put simply: when the body is tired, it shows up on your skin.
Sleep deprivation is now a global epidemic, with only 18% of Japanese consumers satisfied with their sleep, 30% of US adults sleeping less than seven hours per night, and 49% of Australians saying their daily routine does not provide adequate opportunity to sleep all or most of the time. And although ingestible solutions like caffeine have long been go-to remedies for fighting fatigue, overreliance can also contribute to tiredness by disrupting sleep, reducing sleep quality, and increasing daytime sleepiness,
Statistically speaking, you're probably tired right now-and as research shows us, so is your skin.
Over the past five years, social media has popularized countless ways to wake up tired-looking skin-from ice rollers and facial baths to gua sha, DIY masks, and 30-minute red light therapy sessions. While these methods may show instant rejuvenation, they are often difficult to master, time-consuming, uncomfortable or costly.
Introducing The Ordinary's Caffeine 3% + Escin 1% Face Serum – an energizing formula designed to reduce visible signs of fatigue, leaving skin looking more rested and refreshed. This lightweight emulsion, powered by lab-synthesized caffeine and escin, works to reduce visible redness within 4 hours, and boost radiance and skin hydration after a single application, maintaining moisture throughout the day. With continued use, it works to lift, firm, and smooth the skin, promoting a more toned and refreshed appearance. By toning and tightening the skin, this serum helps combat the look of tiredness and puffiness for a more defined, awake-looking appearance.
The Science of Tired Skin
So, how does tiredness actually show up on your skin?
Sleep is an active process that makes up roughly one-third of our lives. As such, sleep is vital for our overall well-being, helping to restore our physical health, emotional balance, and mental clarity. It also plays a significant role in skin function, as skin renewal increases at night-peaking around midnight-and although remaining active, slows down during the day.
Lack of sleep shows up on your skin. It can change texture, tone, firmness, and elasticity. leaving skin looking dull and fatigued. Research has shown that even a single night of poor sleep measurably affects how skin looks, feels, and functions.
Here are some more ways tiredness can be seen on your skin:
Dry appearance | Increased pore visibility |
Rough texture | Dullness |
Appearance of fine lines | Wrinkle prominence |
Lack of sleep can show up in either short-term or long-term periods. Short-term sleep loss typically refers to poor sleep for 1-3 nights, while long-term sleep loss occurs over an extended period. While both short-and long-term sleep loss affect skin firmness and elasticity, they do so in different ways:
Short-term Sleep Loss reduces skin hydration and leads to a decrease in skin firmness and elasticity.
Long-term Sleep Loss is associated with reduced skin barrier function, increased signs of visible skin aging such as uneven skin tone, fine lines and wrinkles, as well as lower satisfaction with appearance. Long-term sleep loss also affects skin collagen. As one of the main components of skin, collagen plays a key role in supporting skin integrity and elasticity. Several factors, including aging and stress, can change the quantity and quality of the skin's collagen.
The Ordinary's Caffeine 3% + Escin 1% Face Serum is formulated to address the full spectrum of these concerns, combining Caffeine, Escin, and Bacillus Ferment to target the key ways sleep loss impacts the skin-both immediately and over time.
Meet Your Morning Molecules:
Caffeine
The stimulant ingredient everyone knows and loves, caffeine is a well-known compound, commonly associated with waking up the skin and body. Testing supports that caffeine energizes the skin, boosts radiance and soothes visible signs of skin irritation-often concerns associated with short-term sleep loss. The Ordinary's formula uses synthetic (lab-made) caffeine.
Escin
A group of molecules found in the extract of horse-chestnut seeds. Already popular in Asian skincare, escin is also valued for its soothing effects-also combating the consequences of short-term sleep loss. However, this ingredient also plays a key role in managing long-term sleep loss effects-lifting and firming the skin by supporting the skin's natural collagen and protecting the skin's structural components.
(Supporting Ingredient) Bacillus Ferment
This is a fermentation-derived ingredient, also referred to as a post-biotic, that is rich in peptides and lipids. Bacillus ferment has been shown to energize the skin and support the skin's structural components, and clinical testing shows it not only improves the look of wrinkles, but boosts skin lifting, firmness, hydration and radiance.
To apply Caffeine 3% + Escin 1% Face Serum, we recommend users to massage the serum into skin for 1-3 minutes. Used alongside the serum, facial massage supports skin microcirculation to help reduce visible signs of fatigue. The result: skin that appears more radiant, firm, and awake – powered by science, made simple.
Pricing: HK$81
