Review: Relastin Eye Silk

Relastin Eye Silk has managed to win Allure’s “Best of Beauty” award for best anti-wrinkle eye cream 2 years in a row, now that’s quite an achievement.  With so many eye creams on the market, I was very curious to see what set Eye Silk apart from the other contenders in order to win that very prestigious title 2 years back-to-back, and what exactly it does for the eye area.  I test many skincare products around the clock it seems!  It takes some strategic planning in advance to schedule a decent amount of time to make what I feel is a proper assessment of a product’s performance.  If you’ve ever wondered how it’s done– here’s a sneak peek behind the scenes!

Generally, I test eye creams for several weeks.  It’s just not realistic in my case that I test them for months at a time unless I were participating in a study or challenge of some sort.  Depending how many are on the schedule, I find that I can personally see if I’m having any benefits within 2-3 weeks of consistent use (unless the product states otherwise) and I’ll use them even longer if time permits.  I take notes along the way of anything I notice, both plusses and minuses, then complete their reviews.  In keeping with my eye cream test driving tradition, I used Relastin’s Eye Silk for 3 weeks.  Before I get to my product assessment, let’s take a look into what makes Eye Silk a little bit different:

Relastin focuses on a “Zinc Firming Complex” as their hero ingredient and credits it with actually increasing the skin’s elasticity.  According to Relastin, the complex works at the cellular level to promote the formation of “functional elastin” versus just stimulating collagen production like many other products.  It makes sense to me– we’ve been losing elastin in our skin since we were teens which leads to the skin losing it’s firmness.  Coming across this complex came by accident believe it or not!

The original goal of the company was to find a better way to move drugs across membranes to improve treatments for heart disease.  Dr. Waugh was experimenting with a specific concentration of Zinc. When he sent samples of treated veins to the lab for analysis, the lab called and insisted he had sent artery samples, which have more elastin. In the midst of a heated scientific argument, Dr. Waugh paused to review the slides and realized the Zinc concentration had increased the elastin in the veins, making them look like arteries.  — relastin.com

So now the ears of my inner-skincare ingredient geek have perked up!  Clinical studies have been conducted and the results sound impressive– “significant reductions in the appearance, number and depth of fine lines, coarse wrinkles, under eye laxity, under eye puffiness and under eye dark circles.”  Which brings us to why we’re here, did it work for me?  My immediate concerns are early signs of aging, a crepey appearance under the eyes and dryness at this time, so I can only speak on those personal results.  The texture of Eye Silk is just that– silky!  Imagine a dimethicone based foundation primer, it feels very similar to that.  What I really appreciated about that aspect was that like most primers, it optically blurs out fine lines and imperfections giving a smoother under eye appearance pretty much immediately.  It also solves one of my pet-peeves, when my concealer decides to migrate and shift spots after a few hours!  It feels moist under my eyes without looking oily which makes me feel I’m getting the much needed hydration that delicate area requires.  After just a few days, my crepey-ness was visibly reduced and only continued to improve with more use.  In my case, Eye Silk met my specific needs!

Feel free to leave a comment if you want to share your experiences with Relastin or with any other eye cream, I’m always curious to hear your take!