Facial barrier cream · 50 ml / 1.7 fl oz
Rü Facial Barrier Cream
For skin that's freaking out right now. Retinol burn, or a face that stings after cleansing. Rü holds water in your skin while it settles, so you can walk into a room without spending the day thinking about your face. Fragrance-free, pH balanced, non-comedogenic.
37.8% less water lost through skin, 24 hours after one application. Published study - see the numbers
About three months of nightly use.
60 nights. Use half the jar. Full refund, and keep the jar.
- Free US shipping on every order, no minimum.
- Made to order in small batches, so give it 2 to 3 days to leave.
- Fragrance-free, non-comedogenic, pH balanced, never on animals.
The $12 drugstore jar
- Oil-in-water, so most of it evaporates off
- Fragrance, the most common irritant in skincare
- A filler oil chosen to survive two years on a shelf
- Made in millions, tested on nobody you will ever meet
Rü · $38
- Water-in-oil, so the water stays under the seal
- Zero fragrance, zero dye, zero drying alcohol
- Six ingredients, every one named and explained
- Sixty nights, refunded, and you keep the jar
If your skin is fine on the $12 jar, keep buying the $12 jar. We mean that. Rü is for skin that is not fine on it.
How to use it
Three steps, and two of them are already habits.
- 01
Leave your face damp
Do not towel dry all the way. Rü is built to seal water in, so give it water to seal.
- 02
A pea, warmed
Rub it between your fingertips for a couple of seconds. It thins out and spreads much further than it looks like it will.
- 03
Press, do not drag
Press it in over cheeks, forehead, jaw, down the neck. Forty seconds later there is nothing on the surface to feel.
The formula
Six things and nothing else.
Short lists are harder to make than long ones. Everything below is there because it does a job you can point at.
- 01
Shea butter
Refills the lipid gaps between skin cells. This is the workhorse.
- 02
Jojoba oil
Closest thing in nature to your own sebum, so skin does not read it as foreign.
- 03
Vegetable glycerin
Pulls water into the upper layers and holds it there.
- 04
Sunflower seed oil
Linoleic acid. Low comedogenicity, calms visible redness.
- 05
Vitamin E
Keeps the oils from oxidising so the jar stays honest to the last scoop.
- 06
Nothing else
No fragrance, no essential oils, no dyes, no drying alcohol, no filler.
The receipts
Most brands quote a number. We publish the paper it came from.
Every efficacy number in skincare comes from a study somebody paid for, and almost nobody tells you which one. Here are ours, with the instrument, the sample, the p-value and the journal, and a page that shows the parts that are not flattering.
37.8%
less water lost through the skin surface, 24 hours after one application
Shea butter at 20 mg/cm², on a Tewameter TM 300. Water loss fell from 8.2 to 5.1 g/m²/h, p < 0.01.
Ptolemy Journal of Chemistry, 5(1), 202558%
more water held in the outer layer over the same 24 hours
Same study, on a Corneometer CM 825. Hydration rose from 32.4% to 51.2%, p < 0.001.
Ptolemy Journal of Chemistry, 5(1), 2025In people
sunflower seed oil preserved barrier integrity and cut water loss in dry and atopic skin
Human trials of the linoleic acid source in this formula, across dry and atopic skin.
Danby et al. 2012, reviewed in Drug Delivery & Transl. Research 2025
These are ingredient studies, not trials of the finished jar. We say so up front, and the full method, the limitations and the parts that are not flattering are all on the evidence page. Read the full method.
Before you buy
The reasons you might not want this.
If you want a cream that smells like a spa, this is not it. There is no fragrance in the jar and there never will be. If you are chasing an overnight retinol-style result, Rü will disappoint you. It repairs a barrier over weeks, quietly.
The drugstore jar is usually oil-in-water with fragrance and a filler oil, because that is what costs nothing to make and what survives two years on a shelf. Rü is water-in-oil, unscented, made in small batches, and priced at $38 because that is what these raw materials cost plus an honest margin. If your skin is fine on the $12 jar, keep buying the $12 jar. We mean that.
It is non-comedogenic and fragrance-free, which removes the two most common triggers. No cream can promise a clean run on every face. If yours reacts, send it back.
Sixty days, jar half empty, full refund, keep the jar. You do not have to explain yourself to us.
Questions
The rest of it.
About three months at a pea-sized amount every night. Twice a day, closer to six or seven weeks.
Both work. Most people find it best as the last step at night, over damp skin. In the morning, use less and give it two minutes before sunscreen.
Yes, and it is one of the better reasons to own it. Apply your active, wait, then Rü on top as the buffer.
There is nothing in the formula that is restricted in pregnancy. We are not doctors, so run the ingredient list past yours.
Yes, and never tested on animals.
Free on every US order, no minimum. Made to order in small batches, so allow two to three days before it leaves.
What the first jars came back with.
Notes from the people who tested the first batches.
“I have used it every night through a Seattle winter. The flaking around my nose is gone. It does not pill under sunscreen.”
“My cheeks stopped stinging after cleansing. That took about ten days and I did not change anything else.”
“It smells like nothing, which after twenty years of scented moisturiser is the entire point for me.”
Facial barrier cream · 50 ml / 1.7 fl oz
Rü Facial Barrier Cream
For skin that's freaking out right now. Retinol burn, or a face that stings after cleansing. Rü holds water in your skin while it settles, so you can walk into a room without spending the day thinking about your face. Fragrance-free, pH balanced, non-comedogenic.
37.8% less water lost through skin, 24 hours after one application. Published study - see the numbers
About three months of nightly use.
60 nights. Use half the jar. Full refund, and keep the jar.
- Free US shipping on every order, no minimum.
- Made to order in small batches, so give it 2 to 3 days to leave.
- Fragrance-free, non-comedogenic, pH balanced, never on animals.
$38
60 nights, refunded, keep the jar