What this is
Surf Skin Lab is a publication about the skin barrier under environmental load, written for people who spend their working and free hours outdoors in cold, wet and windy conditions. Surfers, swimmers, paddlers, sailors, boat crew, coaches, instructors, coastal and marine workers, and anyone else who is regularly cold, wet and being blown at.
It is edited and published by Northbank Media. Articles are written by the editorial desk and are not attributed to invented authors, because the judgement in them belongs to the publication rather than to a person we made up.
The subject is skin physiology and everyday care: what the barrier is, what cold air, wind, salt water, occlusion and friction do to it, and what actually helps. It is not a beauty publication, it is not a product review site and it is not a clinical resource.
What it is not about
Sun protection is not our subject. Ultraviolet exposure is a genuine stressor, it matters at high latitudes and under cloud, and it is comprehensively covered by publications that specialise in it entirely. Here it appears only in passing, as one load among several. Doing one subject properly is the whole editorial proposition.
We do not diagnose or treat. Nothing here is medical advice. Where a presentation crosses out of environmental dryness and mechanical wear, we stop and point to a pharmacist, a GP or, for anything systemic, to emergency services. Those referral lines appear in every relevant article and they are never softened.
How this is funded, in full
Two declared lines, both visible in the footer of every page.
A paid register. A listing of occupational health providers, advisers to outdoor employers, and dermatology and physiotherapy services relevant to outdoor workers. It is published alphabetically, every entry is labelled as paid, and each entry carries only disclosed facts that can be checked, including professional registration where the listed party holds it. It is not a ranking, it is not a recommendation and it is explicitly not a clinical endorsement. We have assessed nobody. The criteria and the price are published on the criteria page.
A newsletter with a sponsor line. One clearly labelled sponsor per issue, in a block that is visually separate from the editorial content and placed after it. The rate is published on the newsletter page, along with a list of what the money cannot buy.
And what we refuse to take money for
We name no brand and no product anywhere on this site. There are no affiliate links. We do not run display advertising or advertising networks. We do not publish sponsored articles. We do not sell links. We do not accept payment for a mention, for a review, for early sight of anything we are going to publish, or for the removal of accurate material.
The reason is structural rather than moral. This publication explains ingredient classes by function so that a reader can evaluate anything they meet. A publication that also names products is read as recommending them, and the explanations become a preamble to a purchase. The two activities cannot coexist without one corrupting the other, so we do not attempt it.
A full list of the refusals, with what each one costs us, is on the standards article.
How the articles are built
Each article is organised around two structural devices that belong to this title.
Stressor and response. A paired block naming one physical load, what it does to the barrier at the level of structure and water loss, how long the effect persists, and the control that addresses that specific mechanism rather than the symptom. It also states what that control does not fix, because that is where most everyday skin advice goes wrong.
Layer view. A cross section of the skin, drawn fresh for each article, marked to show where in the stack a given process happens.
Both are frameworks written by this publication for organising a decision. Neither is a measurement, neither is taken from a study, and every one of them carries a note saying so.
On numbers
We publish no percentages, no measured values, no thresholds and no quantities, because we have measured nothing and would be inventing them. Where a reader wants a figure, we say that there is not a defensible one and give a direction instead. That is less satisfying and more accurate.
Contact and corrections
If something here is wrong, tell us through the contact page and we will correct it with a visible note. We do not remove accurate material at anyone's request, and we have no advertisers who could ask.