The Beauty Routine Legendary Esthetician Sofie Pavitt Has Been Using As Of Late

I remember the first time I came across Sofie Pavitt's Instagram page—my jaw physically dropped. Her feed is sprinkled from top to bottom with the most untouched before-and-after photos from her clients she calls "progress postcards." These images show clients who, before consulting her, struggled with acne, scarring, dark spots—you name it.

From light texture to more severe cases of cystic breakouts, Pavitt has led her clients on the path to clear skin both from her tucked-away studio in the Lower East Side all the way to the West Coast via virtual consults. She is a leader in the movement to prioritize consistent and hyper-tailored at-home skin care—though her plethora of in-studio treatments from cryo facials to laser hair removal certainly can't be overlooked.

"One ingredient that I'm really obsessed with is mandelic acid. I'm always trying different products that people are sending me. But what I have found over time is that as I've gotten older, my skin has gotten dry and quite dull, so regular exfoliation for me is key. What I tend to find is that mandelic is really great for everybody.

"My biggest beauty secret is that I don't take showers, I only take baths. It's very British, I think, but also my favorite thing to do is pour a load of bath oil into a bath and just feel like the greasiest little thing. Sometimes my kids will get in the bath with me too, and then everyone is done at the same time.

"You can put on a face mask in the bath, you can put a hair mask in, and you can do your nails while you're in the bath. I get a lot of stuff done when I'm in the bath!

"I am not somebody who's going to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars on skin care. I get sent a lot to me, and there are a couple brands that I think are worth the money. But I don't mind spending money on fragrance. This is ironic because I don't get to work with fragrance on in the office in case somebody hates it.

"I'm a facialist and I constantly work with running hot water and a lot of actives, and I'll have latex gloves on, so my hands are always really, really stressed out. My cuticles get super dry too. So what I do is use a paraffin hand bath.

"I was working out of a doctor's office in Beverly Hills, and by it they have this really small time-warp pharmacy in the basement of a medical plaza. I went in with my dry hands like, 'Oh my god, I need a hand cream,' and I found this lotion called Corn Huskers Lotion. It looks like a fake product, like something you would find in a kid's pretend kitchen.

"My travel staple has to be a sunscreen, always. My go-to sunscreen for my face all day every day is the IS Clinical Extreme Protect SPF 30. People are always surprised by that and say, 'Oh you don't want a 50?' But actually, I think that a 30 is absolutely fine. If I'm going to the beach, I'll use something more intense, but I don't lay out.

"Medik8 has a retinol, and it's retinal (with an A) that is super gentle. It's so well formulated. You never get flaky when using it, and they have multiple levels of strength. I just love it! I think it's a very gentle and super-effective retinol for beginners as well, which I really like.

"I have my own studio, and I also work for a dermatologist, Cheryl Karcher, MD, who is an amazing medical director. Working for her has been transformative in my learning and my knowledge on skin because I never stop learning working there.

"The concept of placing robust actives between really non-robust products is something that I take so literally in my own practice in taking care of my own skin, but it's something that I really base my foundation of working with everybody on.