Beat the Heat: Summer Beauty Essentials

{Amanda Pratt}

You don’t have to be a desert dweller to feel the effects of summer on your beauty routine! When the mercury rises, it takes all my strength not to crank up the A/C, collapse on the couch, and stay there ’til Labor Day. But I’ve found a few products that make me feel less like an extremely wilted flower and more like…well…a partially wilted flower.

My current fave facial sunscreen is Chanel’s new UV Essentiel. It’s totally invisible and doesn’t make me break out (knock on wood). Solar Recover is a terrific hippy-dippy product that I use as a body moisturizer and a post-sun spritz. It’s cool and refreshing, with ingredients like seaweed extract to soothe and tone. My go-to self-tanner is Neutrogena’s MicroMist (no orange streaks!) and for showers I keep a bar of coconut-scented Skin Trip soap on hand. It’s like a trip to the beach in bar form!

My hair is long, straight, and super fine, so in lieu of conditioning every day I use Aveda’s Damage Control spray to help detangle and smooth, and Terax Life Drops provide a bit of weightless shine. When I go to the beach or the pool, I coat my hair with coconut oil then pull it back in a bun for all-day protection. A colorful headband keeps the look stylish and out of my eyes.

Summer make-up can be especially tricky–I hate feeling like my face is an oilslick by the end of the day. Stick with sheer gel formulas like Bobbi Brown’s fun new glosses (you’ll look like you just ate a popsicle!) and Stila’s Sun Gel bronzer. Laura Mercier’s Oil-Free Primer feels lovely going on, and it prevents the greasies. And what good is wearing sandals all summer if you can’t rock some neon polish on your toenails?

Tell me: What are your summer beauty secrets?