This Is Jennifer Garner's Favorite Sunscreen to Wear Under Makeup
The other day, someone told me she had to remember to buy sunscreen now that it was "SPF season." As a health and beauty writer, I winced. Every season is SPF season. Hopefully, by this point, we're all on board that SPF at the beach is a no-brainer. But just as important is wearing sunscreen every single day, no matter the season, your skin tone, or your age. "There's something about the hubris of being 22, that makes you think you don't need sunscreen — you do, I promise you," Jennifer Garner tells Allure. "When you're in your late 30s, any sun damage you've ever had shows up," she says. "But by the time it shows up, it's too late — all you can do is protect yourself from then on, which does matter, but my gosh! If I had just known at 20, how important sun protection was, I would have been as vigilant as I am now."
I spoke with Garner, a long-time SPF evangelist and Neutrogena ambassador, about her daily sun-protection routine and how she remembers to put it on — rain or shine. Her secret? She's made sunscreen as integral to her skin-care routine as moisturizer. "You don't have intentions to brush your teeth, then not brush them," she laughs. "We all brush our teeth, every single day. [Sunscreen] has to be as non-negotiable as brushing your teeth."
Garner explains that she got hooked on sunscreen when a makeup artist religiously applied Neutrogena Ultra Sheer to her skin every day on set, even when they were shooting inside. "She told me, 'You won't even notice that it's there. It doesn't change the look of the makeup, it's so light, it's so sheer, and it just keeps you protected,'" Garner says. From then on, applying SPF became automatic.
Since becoming a professional sun protection advocate, she's realized just how serious a daily SPF routine really is. "The most surprising thing [I've learned since working with Neutrogena] has been how little it takes to greatly increase your risk of skin cancer," she says. Just five sunburns over the course of your lifetime doubles your risk of melanoma, according to the Skin Cancer Foundation. "Think of how many sunburns you've let yourself get," Garner says. "It's just unnecessary risk for yourself as an adult."
Because it's not often that we see the immediate effects of sun damage — dark spots and hyperpigmentation, wrinkles, a steadily increasing risk of cancer — it's easy to brush off. But that doesn't make taking care of your skin any less important. "You have to wear sunscreen every day," Garner says. "It's just part of your life. It's part of being a human."
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