In-Flight Beauty: The Best Products to Turn Stressful Travel into a Skincare Treatment

Got a lengthy flight approaching? Here are the travel-friendly buys to pack into your hand luggage to ensure to you alight the flight looking fresh.

While jetlag may get to your sleep cycle, there’s no need for travelling across countries and continents to get to your skin too.

Yes, the odds are against you – a night’s sleep gone a-miss, dozing off while wearing your make-up, and of course the dreaded air humidity – but that doesn’t mean you have to surrender to a lacklustre complexion.

Before you reach for your boarding pass, stock up your (cabin-friendly) makeup bag with these beauty buys, and take our advice on how to maximise them while buckled in.

Exfoliating wipes

Before you start the process of your in-flight beauty routine, ensure to remove traces of makeup before letting the skincare goodness sink in.

An easy way to do this is by using wipes that double up to offer a gentle exfoliation. Take Sephora’s travel sized offering.

One side of the wet wipe works to cleanse and remove makeup, while the other buffs and smoothes skin.

Sephora Charcoal Travel Wipes

Multi-purpose balm

A pocket-friendly multipurpose balm is a travel essential, as this can serve as everything from a facial hydrator to a cuticle moisturiser and flyaway-tamers.

This tub of wonder contains skin-nourishing ingredients including olive oil, honey and royal jelly. They work together to infused and protect the skin.

In flight, warm into hands before massaging the cream into the skin or running the slightest amount of product over tresses to smooth and control.

If you’ve still got hours before your descent, apply a thick layer to clean skin as a mask for 15-20 minutes.

Egyptian Magic

Sheet Mask

If you haven’t caught onto the sheet mask trend yet, your next holiday is the time to get on board with the Korean beauty trend.

Rather than a traditional clay mask that will draw out impurities (and, lets face, make a mess at any altitude) sheet masks will infuse goodness into your skin.

Each Star Skin mask is drenched in high-quality serums, and the Illuminating Diamon edition harnesses the power of vitamin C, evening primrose oil and olive oil to exfoliate, calm and rejuvenate.

Starskin Illuminating Luxury Bio-Cellulose Second Skin Face Mask

Eye mask

If you’re anything like us, our hectic everyday lifestyle is enough to leave us with puffy eyes and dark circles, let alone exhausting journeys.

Offer a little TLC to puffy eyes with a calming mask designed particularly for the sensitive skin surrounding the eyes.

Our pick is Rodial’s Dragon’s Blood Eye Masks. Not only are they instantly refreshing, but the arnica extract helps reduce the looks of puffiness and dulling.

Leave this until last, and apply just before you’re ready to land to keep those peepers looking bright.