For most of us, the draw of Korean skincare products is their ability to be effective but also affordable. A glance at all the K-beauty products on Amazon, and you’ll quickly realize we’re not working with luxury prices here… yet they’re all highly rated, utilizing the newest and buzziest ingredients on the market. But what about the bougie people? What if you want all those juicy ingredients for glowy skin, just in an ultra-chic packaging that makes you excited to use it every day? Well, you buy Sulwhasoo, Korea’s original luxury skincare brand.
Last October, I traveled to Seoul to get a sneak peek at Sulwhasoo's reformulated Concentrated Ginseng Rejuvenating Collection and immerse myself in everything K-beauty. In the name of research, I waltzed into every single OliveYoung store I could possibly find (consider it Korea's Ulta), researched TikTok for all the hidden spas (they've got plastic surgeons and cosmetic derms on practically every corner), and visited the House of Sulwhasoo, the brand's flagship store which is practically a K beauty history museum.
At the House of Sulwhasoo, I got a crash course on ginseng, an herb that's been used in Korean culture for centuries. For the uninitiated, ginseng is an extremely powerful antioxidant filled with anti-aging and anti-inflammatory benefits for the skin. Sulwhasoo first started using the ingredient in 1966, effectively making ginseng its hero ingredient forevermore. For decades, Sulwhasoo has reworked its ginseng formula based on new data in the skincare space, making it even more efficacious and delightful with each go.
Diving into all of this K beauty history got me thinking. So many of the trend-focused K beauty brands come and go, but Sulwhasoo has such a strong heritage, which makes it feel inherently more luxurious than anything else out there. Since the brand was founded in 1932, it's had a reputation in Korea as the go-to luxury skincare brand. For many of the Koreans I spoke with in Seoul, their grandmas—who they said had amazing, smooth skin—had been using Sulwhasoo for decades, so they started too. That sort of prestige isn't built on TikTok folks.
Every touchpoint of Sulwhasoo feels more glamorous than other lines from the region too. The brand is plastered on fashion magazines all over the Korean Air lounge at JFK. Heck, you can even purchase a bottle of the Concentrated Ginseng Rejuvenating Serum mid-flight. Everything is in amber glass bottles and jars that look really stunning in my bathroom, but also feel nice to hold. And of course, what's in them is even better. I'll break it all down with my full review for each of the new releases:
Sulwhasoo Concentrated Ginseng Rejuvenating Cream
Even though I have oily skin, I love going to bed with a face coated in moisturizing products, like this hella-hydrating cream. When I smooth this on, it feels so damn luxurious. Obvi, it’s packed with ginseng—as is everything in this line, so get used to hearing about it now—which is fantastic for helping to protect my skin from environmental stressors (important for Seoul and New York). It’s also got glycerin and squalane to seriously inject some hydration into my skin.
Powered by three types of ginseng plus retinol, this is like an all-in-one powerhouse anti-aging cocktail. But don’t let that make you think it’s gonna be irritating or drying—it’s actually one of the most hydrating retinol serums I’ve ever tested, thanks to a combo of hyaluronic acid, glycerin, panthenol, and betain (along with niacinamide to help soothe skin).
Gosh, how I love wrapping my face in an enveloping, rich cream. After the long ass 16-hour flight to Seoul, I desperately needed all the moisture I could get, so I slathered on a thick layer of this rich and tried to get some sleep. It’s loaded with peptides from ginseng and hyaluronic acid, which helps plump up my skin after all the moisture loss on my flight. It’s also got a lil retinol to slowly increase collagen production and cell turnover to reduce fine lines and wrinkles plus vitamin C to brighten. It was like taking a giant gulp of electrolytes for my skin after traveling.
I’m kind of a toner hater (speak your truth, even when your voice shakes!!). But this has convinced me to try again because it’s so soothing and hydrating. I always wondered how people got that translucent, bouncy look to their skin in all the K-beauty TikToks, and it’s a product like this. It really helps add that extra moisture and makes my face look clearer too.
Before bed, I like to massage in a super-balmy eye cream so that I wake up with plump, firm under-eyes. And this really does the trick. I’ll be honest: I barely slept the entire time I was in Seoul (I simply could not get used to the 13-hour time difference), but I didn’t look like I hadn’t slept. And I credit this retinol and ginseng-based eye cream.
Sulwhasoo Concentrated Ginseng Rejuvenating Ampoule
I’m a beauty editor and I also didn’t totally know what an ampoule really was until recently. But lemme explain: The product is actually separated at first (for ~freshness~), so before your first use, you’ll have to shake the bottle to combine them. But the formula itself is a super-lightweight serum you can layer with all of the others in the line but offers an extra dose of peptides and anti-aging ginseng. You don’t need it every single day, but it is a great addition to your skincare routine for a glass-like glow.
Beth Gillette is the beauty editor at Cosmopolitan, where she covers skincare, makeup, hair, nails, and more across digital and print. She can generally be found in bright eyeshadow furiously typing her latest feature or hemming and hawing about a new product you "have to try." Prior to Cosmopolitan, she wrote and edited beauty content as an Editor at The Everygirl for four years. Follow her on Instagram for makeup selfies and a new hair 'do every few months.
