Don’t be a callus hater. Be a lover.
Do a quick search about calluses. No, really. Do it. Everything you’ll read tells you how to remove them or stop making them. And we all get why. Calluses, left to themselves, are gross. They’re rough. They’re dry. They scratch and crack and tear. So you don’t love them. But they serve a purpose, so you try to ignore them.
At SandBar we love your calluses! You don’t need to remove them. And you don’t need to stop making them. You just need to know why they’re awesome and how to care for them.
You already know that calluses are made from repetitive friction. Fun fact: the skin on your hands and feet is naturally designed to reproduce skin cells faster than anywhere else on your body. Hence, you get more calluses on your hands and feet. It’s supposed to happen, so why do we try to remove or hide them?
Because they can get cracked, dry, rough, and just plain nasty. That means you’ve let the dead skin to pile up too high without maintaining the callus. Yes, calluses need to be maintained. NOT removed.
Here’s a quick anatomy lesson about the layers of the skin:
The outer layer of your skin protects the internal tissues from stress and damage. This area of the skin, the epidermis, has no blood vessels and no blood supply. The epidermal cells are created from deeper tissues rather than superficial ones. So when there’s stress placed on the outer skin, the body responds by reinforcing that area (hello calluses).
Calluses show that your body has adapted to the stress over time and that means you’re winning! You’ve probably experienced the opposite: too much stress too fast, means blisters. Calluses become an area of strength and fortification. Not something you should remove or avoid.
"Calloused skin is actually an area of strength in skin that has much better circulation than other areas and are a necessary part of the kinetic chain when it comes to movement. But wait! You thought that a callus was something that was unhealthy, right? When you get a little callus, because of repeated friction (like a corn on your toe or a tiny area of callus on the sole of your foot), this small patch of “health” becomes like a rock in a shoe (or a pea under a mattress if you’re a princess). Ideally, calluses should be developed widely — across the entire palmar surfaces of the hands and feet. We need strength in these tissues to really optimize the whole-body strength actions of both the upper and lower body".-Katy Bowman
At SandBar, we make calloused hands a great part of your life. We know that calluses are proof that you’re working, that you’re living. And when taken care of right, they’re strong, smooth and healthy.
Show your calluses some love with SandBar callus care. Regularly file away the top dead skin to reveal the healthy callus underneath. Then apply SandBar salve and massage into the skin for a smooth finish. Start loving your calluses.