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You probably know the perfect color clothing to wear that accentuates your skin tones and gives you an overall refreshing image, but what about your nails? The colors you choose to apply to your nails can make them either look younger or older. So let’s talk about seven nail polish colors that make your hand look younger.
Brighter yet deeper colors give a strong contrast to your skin making it appear fresher and more youthful. Lighter colors highlight the faults in your skin such as sunspots and vein colors.
We will discuss the age that your hand starts to look older and describe how you can improve the health of your hands, making them look younger. We will also look at the colors that you can use to make your hands look younger as well as the colors you should avoid as they make your nails look older.
Table of Contents
At What Age Do Hands Start To Look Old
The truth is there is no specific age where your hand starts to look older. The appearance of our hands depends on so many other factors. There are many persons older than 40 who have a youthful pair of hands while there are many younger people that have older-looking hands.
Hands can start to look old due to genes. Maybe there is a family history of having older-looking hands. Genes can define how your muscle and skin react at a certain age or in response to internal or external factors.
Internal factors could be how your body reacts to a certain diet or external factors such as hand care methods. Genetics happen in various instances and no one can tell exactly what genetic makeup you will inherit from your parents or grandparents.
Another reason for older-looking hands is something we mentioned just a while ago. A lack of hand care can be a major reason your hands look older than they should. Your hand will react to not being moisturized by drying out and to not being protected from the sun by getting early wrinkles and sunspots, aging your hands considerably.
Another reason is what people may fear to hear the most. Your hands may look older as your body responds to being older. As time passes, the skin on your hands will react to age the way our bodies eventually do.
Sometimes this is especially the case for our hands. Hands have a lot less flesh around them than other parts of our bodies. Our skin is so closely warped to our hands that sometimes the first sign of age will look defined around these areas.
Your hands may simply just have more veins showing than other people’s hands. A lot of veins can make your hands appear older than they actually are. The good news is that if this along with age spots are the problem, you use temporary methods like applying foundations and concealers or you can also use measures that will have lasting results.
We will talk more about those methods later.
Another reason your hands may look older is due to brittle nails. If you have brittle nails there are ways to take care of them so that over time they get stronger and improve the overall appearance of your hands. Brittle nails make your hands look weaker despite your skin actually being older or not.
Healthy nails translate into healthy hands. We will also talk a bit more about caring for your nails later.
Here is a link to a perfect nail care routine.
Ways To Have Younger-looking Hands
Wearing Sunscreen
Sunscreen performs the same benefits for your hands as it does for your hands and face. The effects of lack of sunscreen use will be more visible in your hands as there is looser skin around your hands (especially your fingers) than there are around other parts of your body.
Not using adequate sunscreen on your hands leads to age spots and burnt skin which causes your hands to look more aged. Make it a practice to sunscreen before going outside. Your skin will thank you for it.
Consistent Moisturizing
Moisturizers are your friends. Dry skin will definitely look like older skin. Moisturizers may come from your lotions or just hydrating oils such as coconut oil and olive oils.
Shea and cocoa butter are also good for your skin in restoring moisture.
You can’t only focus on your hands however, to fix dry brittle nails you have to ensure. The plus side is that hydrated cuticles make your polish last longer anyways. So do your skin a favor and give it all the moisture it needs.
Anti-aging Creams
While anti-aging creams may work on your skin, I never saw the difference between them and a good moisturizer. Your skin ages when it doesn’t retain a lot of moisture. And the older you get, the less moisture your skill will retain.
That’s why you need to ensure to help it retain those moistures that it was naturally able to at one point. This can be through your anti-aging cream or the moisturizers that we mentioned before.
Hydrating Yourself
You can do a lot of healing work your skin needs by simply drinking water. Our bodies are 75% water. It needs water to supply enough oxygen to our cells and keep our bodies functioning properly.
If you don’t drink adequate water, you can be doing heaps of damage to your body let alone your hands. Try drinking at least eight glasses of water per day. Over time you will see remarkable improvements in your skin.
Age spots will reduce, the skin will appear plumper and more hydrated.
Exfoliation
Exfoliation removes dead skin cells, giving your skin a chance to reveal its younger qualities. Don’t get too enthusiastic with the scrubbing however as that can cause more harm than good. All you need is a mildly coarse loofah and an exfoliating cream.
You can even go DIY and make your own exfoliating mixture. Good basic ingredients for homemade exfoliation mixtures are sugar and honey. Sugar is coarse enough to lift your dead cells but not too coarse that it will damage your skin.
Ensure to always moisturize after to refresh your skin’s hydration.
Surgery
This is an alternative if concealers don’t work on your veiny hands. This should never be a first resort as all surgical procedures have risks, whether or not it’s for cosmetic reasons. But surgery can alter veiny hands.
I’m not a doctor though, but I can tell you that this is an option. You can speak further with your doctor to see if this is a necessary or safe step for you after you both look at the pros and cons of undergoing surgery.
Vitamins And Minerals
Along with hydrating, ensuring that you have a steady supply of vitamins is great for your skin. What’s more, some vitamins specifically target improving nails. This is a great option to improve brittle nails and promote healthier skin.
If you’re not vegan, then Vitamin D3 is great to promote skin. You can get them from fish oils or the famous omega 3 capsules. The bonus is that vitamin D fortifies your joints.
So, you can have hands that look and feel younger.
Choosing The Right Nail Polish
Yes, your nail polish may be the culprit in your older-looking hands. There are just some colors and consistencies that have a less than flattering effect on your nails than others. Below we’ll talk about what colors are better to wear and also which ones you should avoid completely for your skin type and tone.
What Nail Colors Makes Hands Look Younger
Classic Red
Red is your go-to color for stronger, younger-looking nails. It works for all skin tones and types because it is a fierce, bold color. Your classic red will have a bit of an orange undertone that will brighten the overall appearance of your nails.
It overpowers the other pigments in your skin, softening your hands’ features.
For a perfect finish, you can use reds from brands such as Chanel Le Vernis or Sally Hensen. Ensure the red you use is not blue tones. I will explain why in the section designated for talking about nail polishes we should avoid them.
White
As white is colorless, it doesn’t pick up any of the colors in your skin. It provides a lovely contrast to your skin making it look firmer and more confident. The plain, stroking colors pull attention away from your hands and more on your nails.
What’s more, white compliments any outfit as it brings out the flattering tones, from skin and clothes alike.
White nail polish will also bring a certain shine to your hands. Two colors you tend to notice that only one person is wearing when they are in a room full of people: red and white.
While red is definitely a close second, white is my preferred color as it leaves you a lot of room to decide how to accessorize and compliment it.
An architect told me once that the best way to design a house is to paint all the walls white and let the furniture add color as it will help anything shine better. It’s the same for your nails. This works for deep and light skin tones.
Powder Pink
It’s very important you carefully choose the type of pink you’re using on your nails. Not all pinks are flattering, but powder pinks are. Baby pinks are softer colors that will in turn soften the overall appearance of your hands.
It may bring out the plump qualities and which makes the color comfortable to look at against your skin. Soft pinks can also be very playful colors with lighter color clothing such as yellow or baby blues. I tend to wear pink whenever I plan to wear lighter colors as it agrees more with the soft tones in the garment.
Lime Green
Speaking of lighter colors, lime green is another wonderful option for your choice of nail polish. This one you have to be careful with as some light greens will not be flattering to your hands. This color is for playful people that like to add a bit of pop to their appearance.
It is, for this reason, a good option for your nails if you want to look younger. It draws a lot of attention to the nails themselves without seeming loud and out of place.
Burnt Orange
You want a strong orange tone that isn’t too loud like mere orange would be. A burnt orange look will tone down the party happening on your hands yet give you nice contrast against your skin. If you’ve been paying attention, you’ll see that it’s the colors that contrast your skin that look the best on your hands because it pulls attention away from the hands without being too much to take in.
Burnt oranges go lovely with lighter colors because even if it is the strongest color on your body its strong appearance compliments instead of overpowers your colors.
Navy Blue
We spoke about blues not being a good fit for your hands, but this doesn’t go for navy colors. Navy colors are deep-set and offer a more mature and refined appearance. It might be ironic that such a mature color leaves your hands looking younger.
This is because instead of bringing out the blue veins in your hands as lighter blues do, its depth makes your hands appear more well-toned and moisturized. Like the red, such a strong, deep color gives your hands definition without causing them to look wrinkled. I would wear blue for more formal settings where I would like to make a statement like lime green would but adds more compliment to my skin with its depth and finish.
Dark Green
Like navy blue dark greens are good nail polishes to add to your nails to make them look younger. The contrast gives a youthful glow to your fingernails. Green was already a youthful color, signifying prosperity and newness.
So, applying it to your nails will accentuate the youthful qualities in your skin.
Colors To Avoid
There are nail polish colors that you have to avoid as well. Instead of complimenting your skin it often highlights it and exposes the flaws in them. We’ll take a look at a few below.
Light Blue
If your problem is that you think your hands are too veiny, then you might want to avoid soft blue colors. Although the color itself is a wonderful tone that matches soft-colored clothing, it picks up the blue-colored veins showing through your skin and draws attention to it, allowing your skin to seem older than it actually is. If you want to wear blue, maybe try a deeper blue like the one we talked about above.
Coral Pink
Coral pink is another color you should avoid if you want younger-looking skin. The color has undertones that pick up colors from sunburn splotches on your skin as well as age spots which highlights them and draw unnecessary attention. Instead, aim for softer pinks that pull out your natural flesh tone rather than the imperfections on them.
Dark Purples
Say it with me: Purple picks up patches. That is exactly what deep purple tones do for your skin. Uneven skin tones tend to have hues of purple that are amplified when wearing a similar color nail polish.
While navy colors are generally good to wear, purple is an exception because its tone will pull more attention to your veins and spots more than your gorgeous paint job.
Gels vs Nail Polish: Which Is Right For You?
While gels are more durable and have a professional look and feel to them, the gloss you get from nail polishes adds to your nails. Also, you want to avoid using gel polish if you’re trying to preserve youthful skin. UV rays are needed to harden gels and the last thing your hands need is something else that is causing them to age.
Also, between gels and nail polishes gels end up being damaging to nails as they are more difficult to remove. If you have brittle nails this is definitely not the option for you. Nail polishes can be cleaned off with acetone then rehydrated with moisturizers easily.
For younger-looking nails, I would choose nail polish over the gel.
Conclusion
There you have it, you now know the colors you can choose and the colors you need to avoid. But the best thing you can do for your hands, and body overall, is to give it proper care by hydrating, resting, and treating. While you may not be able to control if your hands naturally look older, the methods I’ve described and the colors that I have suggested will give them a definite boost in appearance.
Sources:
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