In the head-spinning age of multi-step skin-care routines and mic-drop makeup launches, The One is a space for minimalists to sound off on the single beauty product that’s found a longtime spot in their carefully curated routines.
When Laila Gohar, the Cairo-born-and-raised artist and chef known for her conceptual culinary installations, moved to New York City 11 years ago, her complexion was in for a wake-up call: “I have really dry Mediterranean skin that doesn’t like the cold,” Gohar tells me over the phone from her studio in Chinatown, adding that the bone-chilling temperatures—not to mention stress—led to her developing eczema. When a dermatologist prescribed her steroids, however, she resolved to heal it naturally.
“I’ve realized that it’s less about what I put on my skin and more about what I avoid,” she explains, noting that she now favors a handful of “low-key,” fragrance-free products, such as Atlantis Moon Botanicals’s Healing Salve, which she picked up on a whim at a farm stand in Maine this past summer. Infused with organic olive oil, wild rose, St. John’s wort, and beeswax, the one-stop ointment has become Gohar’s loyal companion as of late: She stashes the palm-sized tin, weighing in at just an ounce, in the pockets of her go-to Simone Rocha frocks and reaches for it anytime she feels a dry patch coming on. (Whatever’s left on her fingers is smeared onto her lips and lids.) “It’s not sexy, but it’s real talk.”
“It’s not greasy and it feels supple and soft,” Gohar says of the multipurpose healing salve.
Photo: Courtesy of Laila Gohar