Somewhere under the loose bobby pins and a lipstick that lost its cap, there is a small tin of Vaseline waiting for its moment. It has been waiting a while. Back in 1859 a young chemist named Robert Chesebrough watched Pennsylvania oil workers rub a gluey byproduct they called rod wax onto their cuts and burns, took some home to his Brooklyn lab and spent the next years refining it into something clear and odorless, which he patented in 1872 under the name we all keep in our medicine cabinets. He believed in the stuff so devoutly that he swallowed a spoonful daily and made it to 96. Consider what follows a gentler tribute to his faith, eight expert-approved ways to put that tin to work above the neck.

Your Makeup Bag’s BFF

Start with the glow. Mario Dedivanovic, the makeup artist behind Kim Kardashian’s most photographed faces, reaches for petroleum jelly when he wants what he calls “expensive skin,” patting it along the cheekbones for a lit-from-within finish that costs roughly the price of a latte. The same tin doubles as an eyeshadow primer, so a whisper-thin layer swept over the lids before your usual powder makes the pigment read richer and more saturated, with a glossy payoff if you go heavier.

When the night winds down, that gentleness works in reverse. Dermatologist Mona Gohara rates it among the kindest ways to dissolve mascara and liner, since the jelly lets makeup slide off while the delicate skin around the eye stays undisturbed.

Two smaller tricks round out the bag. A swipe through the brows keeps every hair obediently in place while making the arches look fuller, a lo-fi answer to a missing pomade, and a thin barrier painted around the nail beds before a home manicure catches stray polish, ready to be wiped away once everything sets. Beauty improvisation of this order has a long lineage, given that Chesebrough’s earliest female customers were already mixing his jelly with lamp black on a toothpick to invent mascara from scratch.

The Skincare Case

Vaseline Protective Jelly Original, from $ 1.80

The overnight uses are where things get interesting. Dermatologist Michele Green points to petrolatum as a moisture lock for the under-eye area, where a layer applied before bed leaves the skin looking plumper by morning. Even blemish-prone complexions can play, according to dermatologist Joshua Zeichner, who explains that cosmetic-grade petroleum jelly supports barrier function on inflamed skin while leaving pores clear, which makes it a smart final step over your clarifying products at night. This whole principle now has a name and a fandom, since slugging, the K-beauty ritual of sealing a routine under an occlusive layer, took over the internet by rediscovering exactly what Chesebrough was demonstrating in the 1870s.

The last hack belongs to your fragrance. Cosmetic chemist Ron Robinson suggests dabbing a little on the wrists and neck before you spritz, because scent molecules cling to a moisturized surface and take their time evaporating, which stretches your favorite perfume well into the evening. Nora Ephron devoted an entire book, I Feel Bad About My Neck, to the comedy of upkeep and the fortune it demands. She would have appreciated a whole beauty arsenal that fits in one palm and costs about four dollars.