MirraSkincare
MirraSkincare
MirraSkincare

Green Tea and the Benefits Your Skin Should Be Drinking In

Green tea is one of the oldest tricks in the book, as in, it’s ancient. Fun fact: It’s also one of the world’s most awesome happy accidents, or so they say. Legend has it that back around 2737 B.C. Chinese Emperor Shennong accidentally drank a cup of hot water with a dead leaf in it. At first, he just liked the refreshing taste; now centuries later, we’ve discovered green tea has a whole list of health benefits.

Green Tea For Skincare

From green tea toners to matcha masks, you’ll see green tea in skincare products all over the shelves. Whenever we start seeing something pop up everywhere, you know we love to do some recon. So, here’s the tea (sorry, had to).

Is Green Tea Good For Your Skin?

Yes, green tea has a super power it’s called epigallocatechin gallate, or EGCG, which is a powerful antioxidant. But what does that mean? Let’s take a second to breakdown the word: anti + oxident = something that fights oxidation.  

It Gets Rid of Free Radicals

Pollution sucks for a lot of reasons, and one of them is that it leaves free radicals in the air. You know when you leave an apple out for a few days and it starts to get brown spots? That’s from oxidation that happens because of free radicals, and it’s happening to your skin too. Sorry, that was a tough pill to swallow, so here’s the good news:

Green Tea is Anti-Aging

It’s been found that at the right doses green tea has the ability to rid your skin of reactive oxygen species aka free radicals caused by urban pollution. There were a lot of sciency words in there, but what it really means is that green tea has been proven to fight the signs of aging by scavenging the stuff that gives you dark spots or makes your skin look dull and saggy.

Better Yet, It Fights and Protects

More good news: Not only does green tea get rid of the bad stuff, it gives you the good stuff. Collagen is a hot word right now, but it’s way more than a supplement to add to your smoothie. 

We care about collagen because it’s the stuff that makes our skin look young by giving it structure and bounce. As we get older, our bodies naturally make less and less of it, but green tea can help you with that since EGCG promotes collagen production. 

Glow On...

Everybody knows a cup of green tea gives your body a surge of energy… like coffee but chiller. In your products, that caffeine translates to skin energy, AKA a bright glow. 

Melasma is kind of the anti-glow. Everyone already has melanin in them, it’s what gives us skin pigmentation, but things like birth control, sun damage and pregnancy can cause more of it to show up in awkward places like the upper lip and arm pits. 

Green tea can help with that because it comes from the plant Camellia sinensis. Water extracts from this plant have been proven to be helpful skin-whitening agents which is what we use to reverse melasma.   

It Reduces Acne Redness and Inflammation

Acne irritates your skin and irritation causes inflammation. EGCG has been shown to reduce inflammation, but even better, it can also reduce sebum. When you apply it topically, green tea can help get rid of the redness on the outside of your pimple and the oil on the inside of it.

Drinking green tea can also have some of those same benefits for acne. So, next time you’re breaking out try doing a green tea mask while you brew yourself a cup.

It Helps Your Pores in General

Even when you aren’t breaking out, green tea’s ability to reduce sebum can continue to help your complexion. 

When you look at your face and notice that you can see your pores much more clearly in some places, that’s because you have oil trapped in them. The oil is making your pores expand and become more visible. Green tea masks are great because they can help minimize this issue.  

Green Tea, Our Little Miracle

Anti-aging, antioxidant, anti-acne: basically, green tea is a skincare warrior. So, let’s all take a moment to thank the mythical Emperor Shennong for discovering this amazing ingredient as we click “add to cart” on a green tea face mask. 

 

Sources:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31252129

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5384166/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4483495/

1 comment

  • I love this article. It is full of great information. I feel better when I drink green tea. It gives me a sense of well-being and seems to energize me. Just taking time for tea and it makes my day go better. The fact that it may inhibit fat retention in the body is a bonus! Since we have been living back in the “South” I have discovered “Iced Green Tea”!
    John

Leave a comment

Please note, comments must be approved before they are published

Self Care 101: The 6 Different Types of Self-Care
0 Comment
Too often, we feel swept up in day-to-day tasks, suffocated by our long-term goals, and stumped by the opposition tha ...
How to Have Good Sleep Hygiene For a Good Night’s Rest
0 Comment
Although brushing your teeth, showering, or washing your face seem like no-brainers in some of our bedtime routines, ...
Myth Busted! Do Skin Care Ingredients in Hair Care Products Work?
0 Comment
It feels like nothing is simple these days. We’ve gone from picking up the cheapest, best-scented drugstore hair prod ...