I’ve become far more serious about skincare as I’ve got older. Not necessarily more complicated with it, if anything, the opposite. I don’t want a bathroom cabinet full of products that I use once and then forget about. I want a routine that’s relatively simple, feels good to use every day and, importantly, is focused on the things that matter to me now: hydration, skin barrier health, resilience and keeping my skin looking as healthy as possible as I age.

That’s where La Mer comes in.

This September, La Mer is introducing its latest approach to skin longevity, centred around three products: The NEW Concentrate, The Moisturizing Soft Cream and The Rejuvenating Night Cream.

The idea is essentially to work with the skin around the clock, supporting resilience and protection during the day, then recovery and renewal while you sleep. And that makes a lot of sense to me.

Skincare in your 40s is different

For years, my approach to skincare was probably fairly typical: cleanse, moisturise and hope for the best. But your skin changes as you get older. For me, skincare now isn't about trying to suddenly look ten years younger. It's about looking after the skin I have.

Hydration becomes more important. So does maintaining a healthy skin barrier. Then there are all the everyday factors, travel, flights, lack of sleep, weather, stress and generally being busy, that can leave my skin looking tired, dry or a little lacklustre.

It's why I've increasingly gravitated towards products that support the condition and resilience of my skin rather than constantly adding more steps to my routine. And La Mer's latest trio fits particularly well into that philosophy.

Step One: The NEW Concentrate

The product at the heart of the new launch is The Concentrate, which has now been reformulated. The new formula combines La Mer's 4X Concentrated Miracle Broth™ with new Liquid Barrier Technology and new Clarity Algae.

The focus here is the skin barrier. If you've ever noticed your skin becoming dry, tight, irritated or generally looking a little worse for wear after travelling, changes in weather or a particularly busy week, your skin barrier can play a big part in how your complexion looks and feels.

The Concentrate is designed to help strengthen that barrier while calming visible sensitivities associated with signs of ageing and helping the skin adapt to everyday environmental stressors.

La Mer reports that after just one use, the skin barrier was repaired by 38%, while 94% of those tested said their skin looked regenerated.

For me, though, the appeal is also its place within a routine. This isn't about adding another unnecessary skincare step. I use it after cleansing and before moisturiser as the treatment stage of my routine. It's the product doing the heavier lifting before I lock everything in with a cream.

Step Two: The Moisturizing Soft Cream

If The Concentrate is about strengthening and supporting the skin, The Moisturizing Soft Cream is about maintaining hydration and rejuvenation throughout the day.

A good moisturiser is probably the one skincare product I notice most when I don't use it.

My skin can quickly start feeling dry, particularly after showering, travelling or spending time outside. So I want something substantial enough to keep my skin hydrated but not so heavy that I feel like I'm wearing a layer of product all day. That's where the Soft Cream works particularly well for me.

The texture is lighter than you might expect from La Mer's famously rich moisturisers, which makes it particularly easy to incorporate into an everyday morning routine. After cleansing and applying The Concentrate, I'll massage a small amount into my face and neck.

And that's essentially my daytime routine done with SPF as the final essential step before heading outside.

Step Three: The Rejuvenating Night Cream

Night-time is where things get slightly more interesting. While we're asleep, our skin naturally goes through processes of repair and renewal, so my evening routine is less about protecting my skin from what's coming and more about supporting that recovery.

The Rejuvenating Night Cream has been developed specifically with this in mind.

It contains Marine Retinol Alternative MRA-3 alongside Bioenergetic Miracle Broth™, designed to support overnight renewal and help improve the appearance of the skin while you sleep.

The "retinol alternative" element particularly interests me. Retinol has become one of those skincare ingredients everybody seems to know about, but it isn't necessarily something every skin type finds easy to tolerate.

La Mer's approach is designed around supporting rejuvenation without simply making the routine more aggressive. Applied as the final step before bed, the Night Cream completes the 24-hour approach: resilience and hydration through the day, rejuvenation through the night.

Across the regimen, La Mer reports that 92% of those tested agreed their skin looked more youthful.

My simple La Mer routine

Despite all of the science behind these products, my actual routine couldn't be much simpler.

Morning: Cleanse → The Concentrate → The Moisturizing Soft Cream → SPF.

Evening: Cleanse → The Concentrate → The Rejuvenating Night Cream.

That's it.

I've learnt that consistency is far more useful to me than having a complicated ten-step routine that I'm realistically never going to maintain. And these are products I actually look forward to using.

Is La Mer worth the investment?

There's no avoiding the obvious point: La Mer is luxury skincare. These aren't inexpensive products, and I don't think there's much point pretending otherwise. For me, however, skincare is one of those areas where I'm increasingly happy to invest in fewer products that I genuinely enjoy using every single day.

There's also something to be said for the experience. From the textures to the way the products sit on the skin, La Mer makes skincare feel less like another thing I have to remember to do and more like a small ritual at the beginning and end of the day. And if that means I'm more consistent with my skincare, that's important too.

The bigger picture: skin longevity

What I particularly like about La Mer's latest launch is the shift in conversation from simply being "anti-ageing" to thinking about skin longevity.

I'm not particularly interested in trying to erase every line from my face. Ageing is inevitable and I'm absolutely fine with looking my age. What I do want is for my skin to look healthy.

For me, that means keeping it hydrated, supporting the skin barrier, protecting it during the day and giving it the right environment to recover overnight.

The NEW Concentrate, The Moisturizing Soft Cream and The Rejuvenating Night Cream make that incredibly easy to incorporate into an everyday routine. Three products. Morning and night. Nothing unnecessarily complicated. Because perhaps the best skincare routine isn't the one with the most steps.

It's the one you're actually going to stick to.