Mastering Dry Brushing: Techniques for Better Skin Absorption
As Goop's new guide on dry brushing lands, Allure has dropped its annual roundup of 27 body care upgrades within hours — and for anyone working with botanical oils and butters, the overlap is worth a closer read.
How To Dry Brush Your Body & What Are The Benefits
Achy, tight skin after the shower, that midweek feeling where nothing quite absorbs, is the kind of sensory signal that pulls formulators back to pre-product ritual, and both pieces arrive squarely in that space.
What the Goop guide signals
The dry brushing piece lands as part of a broader return to manual exfoliation and intentional skin prep before product application. While the full technique details sit with the source, its placement in a mainstream wellness outlet confirms that dry brushing has moved from spa niche into everyday body care vocabulary. For formulators building around rich butters and carrier oils, that's worth noting — the canvas you apply to shapes the result as much as the formula itself.
What Allure's 27 upgrades say about lipid delivery and scent
Allure's Best of Body winners tell a clearer story for our corner of the craft. Salt & Stone's Bergamot & Hinoki body wash stood out for its crisp bergamot note wrapped around an earthy hinoki base, with aloe and glycerin doing the humectant work beneath the foam. Glasshouse Fragrances' Kyoto in Bloom Body Bar surprised testers who expected bar soap to be forgettable; sweet almond oil, shea, and vitamin E give it a lipid profile that lingers past the rinse, and the amber-lotus fragrance carries depth without becoming loud. Dove's Serum+ Radiance Oil Body Wash went the other direction — 50% glycerin in a formula built for skin that's particularly parched or in need of extra TLC.
The throughline is hard to miss: lipid-rich formulas and fragrance are no longer competing priorities. The winning body products carry both, and they're being judged on skin feel hours after the shower, not just in the first thirty seconds.
What to check in your own studio
If you've been applying body butter or oil to skin that hasn't been properly prepped, the Allure roundup is a quiet reminder that texture underneath affects absorption more than the formula on top. A clean, slightly exfoliated surface takes up carrier oils more evenly — the lipid profile of shea or marula sits on the skin rather than catching on dead cells. That's the practical bridge between the two publications: whether you dry brush, use a granular scrub, or simply massage with intention before applying your oil, the few minutes before product contact reshape how the butters behave.
I'll be watching for follow-up coverage on technique frequency and brush material — those details tend to surface in the second wave of any new body ritual trend, and they'll matter more for formulators than the initial announcement.