Have you ever counted how many times a day you turn on the tap? Rinsing vegetables, washing the chopping board, clearing plates, wringing out a cloth. Hands that work in a kitchen move between water and detergent from morning until night, and most dryness and chapping on the hands advances quietly inside this repetition.
Kitchen hands are washed once more at the end of cooking, and once more again at the end of clearing up. The amount of water that passes over them in a day bears no comparison with the face, yet the face is the part we think to care for.
Wet work itself cannot be avoided. What can change is the way it is done: the temperature of the water, whether gloves are worn, how the hands are dried, and what happens in the minute after. This article follows those gestures in order, as they happen at the sink.
What water and detergent leave behind
The skin on the back of the hand is thin and has few sebaceous glands. The water held in the stratum corneum is protected by a film of sebum, and washing and friction remove that film more easily than almost anything else we do. Detergent is designed to lift grease, so along with the grease on the plates it lifts the natural oils from the skin.
The oil lost in a single wash is small. Repeated at breakfast, lunch and dinner, though, the loss outpaces the skin's ability to replace it. Dry hands do not arrive suddenly; they are the result of a balance that tips slowly into deficit, a little further each day. Seen this way, the priorities for protection become clearer.
Staying wet for a long time is a burden in its own right. Skin that has soaked in water swells, and as it dries it gives up moisture along with the water on its surface. That strangely rough feeling after the washing-up is what happens at the moment of drying. Brittle nails, too, are often linked to long periods of wetness and to handling detergent without gloves.
Three promises at the sink
Set the water to "slightly cool"
It is tempting to turn the hot tap up to shift grease. Hot water, however, strips sebum and breaks down the barrier that keeps moisture in. A useful benchmark for washing-up water is a temperature that feels slightly cool when you put your hands in.
When truly hot water is needed, wear gloves, or soak the dishes first so that the grease lifts before you wash. Keeping the skin's oils and getting the dishes clean are not in conflict.
The case for gloves
For washing up, cleaning and gardening, gloves are recommended because hot water, detergent and soil all dry the skin. The longer the stretch of wet work, the greater the difference a pair of gloves makes.
Put gloves on only when your hands are completely dry; damp hands leave moisture trapped inside the glove against the skin. Powder-free or latex-free gloves reduce irritation. Turning the gloves inside out to dry from time to time keeps them pleasant to wear. If gloves feel like too much for a quick rinse, reserve them for the longer sessions, the evening washing-up or the weekly clean, where the exposure is greatest.
Never leave the hands wet
Shaking the water off and moving on to the next task is a habit most of us share, and it prolongs the drying moment that costs the skin its moisture. Once the washing is done, press a towel gently against the hands and take up the droplets between the fingers and around the nails. There is no need to rub; pressing is enough. A dry towel kept within reach of the sink, changed often, makes this far easier to remember than one hanging across the room.
Then moisturise with as little delay as possible. The minutes after wet work are when the hands lose moisture most readily. If drying and moisturising become a single movement, the hands are put back in order every time you step away from the sink.
Keep the after-detergent moisture light
After contact with detergent, the hands carry an invisible dryness. Rinsing removes the detergent, but the sebum that went with it does not come back on its own for some time. That is why the single application that follows detergent matters more than any other during the day.
One reason moisturising fails in the kitchen is stickiness. If the hands feel slick halfway through cooking, the next ingredient or utensil becomes a worry, and the moisturiser is postponed. For daytime, choose something that sinks in quickly and leaves no residue; it will be used far more often.
At night, when the day's wet work is finished, take a little longer. Work the product from the back of the hand to the fingertips and around the nails. On days of severe dryness, a cream can be layered on top: a water-based serum first, an oil-based cream second. The full sequence is set out in our hand beauty guide.
How Soie approaches it
Soie proposes that hands which are washed often are exactly the hands that need washing and moisturising to be one habit. Moist Fragrance Hand & Body Soap moisturises with every wash and is designed to leave the hands without the tight feeling that follows an ordinary soap, which suits people who wash their hands many times a day. Follow it with Enlight Hand Serum and you can return to the next task without stickiness.
The hands in the kitchen are the hands that put a meal on the table. If they feel rough by the end of the evening, lower the water temperature a little, keep a pair of gloves beside the sink, and moisturise as soon as you have dried them. Three small promises, starting tomorrow. For the washing itself, see also how to wash your hands without roughness.
