The DIY beauty brand
They’re overpriced, overpackaged and full of chemical nasties. So shouldn’t we try cooking up our own cosmetics? Rebecca Armstrong gets busy with the beeswax - because she’s worth it.
Thursday March 13 2008
Checking food labels for nasties has become de rigueur among those who care about what goes into their bodies, but, according to beauty expert – and co-founder of organic-chocolate company Green & Black's – Jo Fairley, it's time to start thinking about what goes on them too.
Jo says: “I prefer to know exactly what I'm putting on my skin, just as I choose carefully what I put in my mouth – I grow, buy and eat exclusively organic food,” she says. “The logical progression from thinking about what you put in your body is thinking about what you put on your skin.”
NATURAL
To this end, Fairley has written The Ultimate Natural Beauty Book, a guide to do-it-yourself beauty products, which features recipes for 100 lotions and potions. By encouraging people to make their own cosmetics, the book taps into the fact that the beauty industry is increasingly coming under fire on a number of fronts.
Last year, research funded by the breast-cancer charity Genesis suggested that there was a possible link between breast cancer and aluminium found in antiperspirants. And research conducted by the biochemist Richard Bence claimed that an individual can absorb up to 4lb 6oz of chemicals through their skin each year. Given that women use on average 12 skincare and makeup products every day – a combination that can clock up as many as 175 different chemicals – it's unsurprising that consumers are becoming concerned about exactly what their toiletries contain.
One of the benefits of brewing your shampoo at home, says Fairley, is that you know exactly what's going into it and whether any of the ingredients have an impact on the environment. “I don't think petrochemicals have any place in what we put on our skin,” she says.
“I would rather use something that is renewable and sustainable, and can be grown season after season. It's possible that our descendants will need every last drop of oil that the earth can produce for light and heat, and I don't want to be responsible for having consumed a single extra drop of that, just to slather something on my face, when I can use something that is natural and renewable.”
Ditching branded beauty products is also a way of reducing the “moisturiser miles” that are an inevitable result of buying products shipped from the other side of the globe, while decanting your concoctions into old glass bottles and plastic containers means less waste, too.
RECIPES
So, the green credentials of Fairley's recipes hold up, but surely they're tricky for the average woman, without a lab and a white-coat, to create? Apparently not. “If you can make a dressing or melt chocolate, you can make your own cosmetics.”
While I'm a dab hand at vinaigrette, my past forays into making my own cosmetics – creating pongy “perfume” from browning rose petals and water, then stirring my mother's unguents together in an unholy mess – haven't been much to write home about.
Despite this, I'm keen to see if Fairley's home-made cosmetics work. Leafing through her book, I pick five “essentials” to try: aloe vera cleanser, rich rose moisturiser, simple soapwort shampoo, lavender deodourant and beetroot lip and cheek tint.
At the back of the book is a list of companies that stock the dried roots, essential oils, vegetable glycerine and beeswax granules required, and after spending £40 (€52) on two online orders and a couple of beetroots, it's time to put on that apron.
