Still, fresh, natural makeup is his M.O. A healthy, hydrated canvas is the bedrock of any radiant makeup look, which is exactly why he started his own clean skin care line, Leland Francis (the name pays homage to his great grandfather, who established the Western Oklahoma farm where Peña was raised). Each nourishing formula serves as the perfect prep step for a stunning face beat—would you expect anything less from a seasoned makeup pro? Below, Peña dishes all of his skin care secrets (from his own line and beyond), including the drugstore cream he reaches for in a pinch and the treatment that healed his sunspots overnight. “At that point, I had always been very afraid of face oils, and I was like, ‘Well, maybe I should try this, too, because I had severely acne-prone skin.’ So I just started using a little bit of face oil, and what I found out is that it kind of did heal my skin because I was using so much to dry out my skin to keep it from breaking out. From then on, I just became a lover of face oils. “I have been using the [Leland Francis] 29 Botanical Serum and the Luxe Face Oil. Those are really the only two that I use religiously. I do like to try other brands, but I always just fall back to those because I know that they’re tried and true, and they work well with my skin.”
Leland Francis Luxe Face Oil “I’m super sensitive, so I can break out in hives at the drop of a hat. So I always look for something that’s going to be a little bit more on the natural side, but I do like the La Mer [Crème de la Mer]. If I’m super, super dry, the Augustinus Bader Rich Cream is good, but I like something that has a little bit more thickness to it. “I would say I like the mixture between the La Mer and The Rich Cream that I have [in my brand]. It’s thicker, yet it goes on smooth.”
Augustinus Bader The Rich Cream
La Mer Crème de la Mer “I will tell you the one thing that I’ve actually become obsessed with is this thing called a stem cell facial. Basically, it is a microneedling facial, and they take exosomes, which are basically like stem cells, and they do a pass of hyaluronic acid into the skin with the microneedling. “And then once they see a little bit of the blood through the microneedling, they use exosomes on your face. It’s basically stem cells that help revitalize and heal your face. There’s no downtime to it, which is amazing. The exosomes actually heal your face, and you can go to work the next day. “[I go to] Nathan Ford, who is also my doctor now… I had sun spots on my nose and on my forehead, and I took a photo of me laying down in the chair, and then I took a photo the next morning just to see. I did it side-by-side, and you can see the difference in how much brighter my face looked and how it got rid of some of my sunspots. I was surprised by it.”
ReFa Carat Ray Face “What’s great about it is you can manipulate it to be as thin or as heavy as you want it to be. You just use a little bit less of it, and you heat it up more, so that way you can just press it into your skin. The more you heat it up, the more malleable it becomes. “The little tin is so inexpensive, but it’s actually a really good moisturizer. So you can always just take that and know it’s going to work great for you.”
NIVEA Body, Face, and Hand Moisturizing Cream
Drunk Elephant C-Tango Vitamin C Eye Cream “I have my Leland Francis Lip & Eye Balm, and I also have my little ReFa face roller that I keep in my backpack when I travel. I feel like that’s good for flights when you’re feeling a little dry. And it’s solid, so you can always take it through TSA.”
Leland Francis Lip & Eye Balm “[Bobbi Brown taught me] not to overdo it. Simplicity is the best when it comes to makeup. So I think that’s why when I do makeup, it’s all about the skin. If you can get the skin right, most generally, everything else looks good.”
