I’m Rachel Kelloway. I wear alot of hats as a health coach, wellness chef and editor of Simplywell, and if there’s one thing you should know about me—it’s that I’m not some flawless, airbrushed beauty editor with perfect skin.
Firstly, I live in the Northeast of America, where the New York winters are absolutely brutal on my skin—a far cry from where I grew up in the misty subtropics of Australia, where the air was so humid you could forget to wear moisturizer entirely.
Secondly, I’m also no spring chicken. I don’t have the collagen of a freshly hatched Gen Z doing selfies with reckless abandon. I face looking into the mirror at even-deepening laughter lines (I refuse to call them wrinkles!) and I’ve had my fair share of skin struggles, including rosacea.
All this makes finding the right products even more important for me. For years, I relied on foundation and concealer to create what I thought was a “natural” look—but the truth is, I wasn’t confident in my skin without it.
So I decided to do something different. I ditched my makeup routine entirely. I switched to a clean beauty approach, focusing on skincare instead of coverage. And to healing from the inside out instead of constantly ‘covering up’.
Instead, I committed to simple, effective beauty products that worked with my skin—not against it.
Here’s what happened.
My No-Makeup Makeup Journey
In the beginning…
The first few days were rough. I was so used to wearing makeup daily that my face felt naked without it. I’d instinctively see all the flaws. My skin had been used to being covered up, and now I had to face it (literally).
I started with the biggest concern first. That ever present dehydration. The freezing cold dry winter air is no friend to fine skin. It made my face feel tight and sensitive. And dry skin is not kind to laughter lines!
I went all-in on serum. After trying a bunch of products, I fell in love with one that really worked for me. Made from seaweed and snow mushrooms, this totally natural serum changed the game. It plumped up my previously dehydrated, tight skin and kept it hydrated and dewy. It was a whole new lease on life for me. It absorbed quickly and gave me back the bouncey, juicy feeling of my natural skin.
That serum was Osea’s hyaluronic sea serum. It’s clinically and dermatologically tested. And just plain works wonders.
This hydrating serum is packed with natural hyaluronic acid to maintain moisture and really gave my skin a fresh start.
After just a few days, my skin tone looked more calm and even—without any makeup tricks.
Confidence Without Coverage
Something clicked. Now that I wasn’t dealing with the usual fine lines or redness that made me reach for cover in the past, I realized I could re-invent what came next.
Instead of layering on heavy thick moisturizer for hydration, I could go for something lighter.
I replaced my usual moisturizer with a clean lightweight moisturizer, which kept my skin hydrated while maintaining that clean, fresh look.
I also focused on exfoliation to remove dead skin cells which really helped the products absorb fully and work their magic, while encouraging my complexion to refresh naturally.
My Skin Started to Change
With these simple shifts in products, my natural glow started to come through.
My no-makeup makeup look was now coming from my skin itself, not a beauty product. Biggest lesson: When your skin is healthy, you don’t need to fake a flawless look.
But there was one last hurdle…
With perpetually dry air from indoor winter heating, my lips were really sufferring. Always dry. Always on the verge of cracking, regrdless of how much lip balm I applied. It was like my lips were drinking in the lip balm and it was gone. I’d wake up in the middle of the night with lips as dry as the Sahara Desert. So dry the discomfort would literally wake me up. I had to keep lip balm beside my bed!
This is when the final piece of the puzzle fell into place. I started applying a natural lip sleeping mask. With coconut oil, shea butter, vitiman C and murumuru butter. This was a game-changer. The product was Laniege Lip Sleeping Mask. It’s key ingredients are totally natural and it’s formulated without Parabens, Pthalates or Sulfates. No more waking up from dry lips. no more crusty dried up lip skin. Instead they were soft and hydrated.
Upgrading my No-Makeup Makeup Look…
I realized something major—I liked my face without foundation. My skin texture looked refined, my pores were less noticeable, and I wasn’t seeing the same fine lines that used to make me dart to more flattering lighting conditions.
Instead of sculpting my face with contouring, I let my natural contours shine. I kept up with hydration, and my skin retained its glow all day.
On occassions that warranted a more made up look, I swapped my lightweight moisturizer for a lightweight natural skin tint. It evened out my skin tone ever-so-subtley, without covering up my skin. That tint was Chantecaille’s Just Skin Tinted Moisturizer Sunscreen Broad Spectrum SPF 15. And it’s exactly what it says it is : Just Skin. What I adore about this product is its skincare first, tint second. It has hydrating botanicals and is totally free from fragrance, parabens, silicones, or microplastics.
It lets your natural skin shine through and ust adds the most subtle tint, so your completely natural glowing skin skines through.
I also had one last upgrade to make. My lashes looked threadbare without mascara. Skipping mascara made my eyes look little less defined. So I switched to a clean lash serum to help strengthen and condition them naturally.
By now, I wasn’t thinking about my makeup trend or worrying about how my face looked in photos. I just felt good—and it showed.
Final Thoughts: Should You Try a Clean Beauty Reset?
If you’ve ever felt dependent on makeup to feel confident, I highly recommend trying a clean beauty reset—even for just a month. It forced me to rethink how I saw myself and made me realize that my natural complexion is something to be embraced, not covered up.
By focusing on skincare instead of coverage, my beauty routine became about nourishing my skin, not masking it. And let’s be honest—there’s something incredibly freeing about spending less time applying makeup and more time just living.
Would I go back to my old makeup routine? Not a chance. A simple, clean beauty approach gives me everything I need—without the heavy layers.
