I look forward to the answer to this! My mother tried to hold back time for years - liberally coating herself in various unctions and lotions - frequently going to bed smelling like a fruit and veg shop, or a chemical factory! Lemon juice/baking powder paste/onion juice (this was particularly foul!!)/cider vinegar poltices/skin bleach - you name it, she tried it. Pointless! She had grown up in the 30's and 40's, loved the outdoor life, but had never heard of sun-tan cream (it wasn't freely available anyway). She had also smoked as a young woman, and growing up in war-time Britain, had a few years where she didn't have a varied diet, so was effectively mal-nourished. By the time she was 60, our family GP said she would have to use bleach twice a day for a year to try and lighten them, so advised her to stop trying to get rid of them,& use make-up to help disguise the more noticeable ones on her face, and let him check them regularly to make sure none of them were 'nasty' (two were removed from her forearm when she was 65, which thankfully, despite being malignant, didn't require chemo - that happened when she was 68 and developed breast cancer)!!

interesting set of comments

Thanks for the comments Jabba - the situation i'm considering is rather different - skin well cared for, reasonably healthy diet and person genuinely interested in skin health and hence skin care - i've used the usual and even more obscure carrier oils as well as various EOs but time seems to continue to take its toll!:)