FACT: Crabtree & Evelyn's hand creams are fantastic. FACT: anyone would be happy to get one of them as a stocking filler – and we still dream of receiving the full colourful set, which C&E offer every year as a Christmas gift! (This year it's in the form of a 12-cream advent calendar which you can find here...)

This is an excellent new addition to the hand cream line-up, however, which shares the usual Crabtree & Evelyn handcare virtues of sinking in fast, leaving skin soft-as-velvet, and smelling pretty. (In this case, a subtle 'fresh' scent, with marine undertones.) 

It's powered by botanical as well as marine extracts, in a blend of shea butter, soya and jojoba oils for moisturisation, alongside a peptide blend and a time-released antioxidant complex. 

The earlier incarnation of this hand cream has done jolly well in our Beauty Bible trials, over the years – and we'll be nudging Crabtree & Evelyn to submit this for our next round of testing. It's too early to say if it truly offers age-defying benefits (over time, it's said to work at evening out skintone) – but the sheer pleasure factor of this means we ourselves are slathering regularly...

It's also in a light, plastic tube – as friendly to handbags as it is to your hands.

£19 for 70 ml – buy here