Posts from — December 2008

Is there such a beast as organic makeup? Why is it so hard to find?

Once you decide to take steps towards consuming natural products inside and out, it doesn’t take long to realize that while there is a whole plethora of quality organic skin care products, the field seriously thins out when it comes to organic makeup. Suspicious ingredients pop up even in the most respected brands. And in general, there are just far fewer choices.

Why is that?

The most important reason why organic skin care dominates and makeup lags is because of their intrinsic purposes. Think about it. The goal of any skin care is to nourish the skin from inside and out to reach its naturally healthiest potential. So ideally, if your skin maintains an equilibrium of required vitamins, minerals and other building components it will look good. Thus organic skin care aims to find the best ingredients in nature that provide these building/nourishing materials. And since nature is where we as humans get the building material for our bodies, it is not so difficult to find the right combinations of ingredients, to grow them organically and then make the skin care products.

But with makeup the goals are diametrically opposite. More often than not we are not looking to enhance a natural quality of our skins. There is nothing natural in purple lips, grey eye shadows or tinted eyebrows. With makeup we are not looking for ingredients that the skin will absorb. We are looking for ingredients that will stay on top, preferably in the place we designated.

So there is the dilemma. Finding the right combination so that the part that absorbs is natural and safe for the skin, while the pigmented part remains on the top in proper consistency/shininess/matte levels. Not to mention that the pigment itself has to be just the right shade. And of course, there is always the fact that after so many years of exposure to the beauty industry, the consumers have a very clear expectations of the products they need and the format they should come in (lipstick in a tube, powdered eye shadows, pencils for the liners).

And this is a much harder task. Far fewer companies are up to it. We all have expectations on how mascara has to “behave” and color expectations for shadows, foundations and lipsticks. Meeting these expectations with all-natural ingredients is a hard task for many. So synthetics, questionable ingredients and technology slip in here and there… But it’s our job as consumers to keep pressing these companies to come up with better and safer solutions. Continuous improvement needs to be a motto of all companies that have the potential to affect human health.

Taking bold risks is an option too. Consider SukiColor. That’s one company that totally rethought the idea of what makeup is. They don’t even have conventional powders or lipstick tubes. But they have a variety of creamy pigments that can work on your eyes, your cheeks and lips. For example
suki triple cream eye definer – sandalwood
can serve as an eyeliner, a brow liner and a shadow. While something like
suki pure cream stain lip/cheek – opal
can serve as a lip color and a cheek highlighter, creating automatic coordination in colors and completely defying expectations on what lipstick and rouge can be. It goes back to basics – makeup is color for the face. Here is color. Here is a brush. Apply anywhere.

Bold. Innovative. Natural. And since they work with creamy textures, they don’t have to worry about finding natural ways to create powdered shadows and the like. Hence no need to worry about whether talc is safe or not.

Perhaps that’s what organic makeup should be about. Defying expectations. Going back to the basics. Enhancing natural beauty with natural means. Maybe the task of finding organic solutions will be easier if preconceptions of what makeup needs to look and feel like can be stripped. When it all becomes simply about colors blending with our skin thinking out of the box could produce many more truly safe and healthy options for our faces.

After all, take a good look at nature. With such an abandunce of color around it’s hard to believe that there is no way for us to harmoniously work it into our own beauty system.

PS: For those new to this site, I do have a list of natural makeup manufacturers here. They may not always be 100% perfect, but at least they are trying. And they are definetly safer for you then the mainstream brands.

I’m not even sure if I should write the following under the heading of sarcastic, ironic, or, what was that about?

I came upon the book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Better Skinat my local library, and thought I’ll read up a bit. After all, this line of books is a bestseller and many a woman probably skims through books like these for advice.

So, ahem, imagine my surprise when somewhere tacked at the back of a chapter I found a section on natural skin care.

One and a half pages dedicated to natural skin care! With TWO CAUTION BOXES!!! And not even a mention of organic skin care or anything…

So, ladies, apparently (according to the book) you should always wear lipstick, balm or something on your lips for moisture and protection, you should use tons of skin care products if you want to have a healthy skin, but if something is natural – beware! It’s dangerous!

And I quote:

A subheading of Chapter 8: “The risks of going natural”. Sums up the attitude well, doesn’t it? This is a chapter about ingredients in skin care. No other category is defined as risky.

“Using all-natural products can be a serious health and safety concern.” And there is a “nice” example of a relatable story: “Andrea wanted to find a new skin care line that would be gentler to her skin. A friend recommended she try an upscale and expensive all-natural line. As soon as her beginner kit arrived, Andrea washed, toned, and moisturized her skin. Within three minutes, her face began to burn and sting, becoming red and inflamed. Ouch, Even totally natural products can cause inflammation and allergic reactions.”

Here is my issue with this story. First of all, there aren’t that many “upscale and expensive all-natural lines” out there. And of the ones I know, none would create such a reaction in a normal skin. So if Andrea reacts this way to these products, she probably has a history to reacting to products in general. In this case she must be a complete idiot to try all three totally new products all over her face at once! Otherwise this story is a complete fabrication to defame truly all-natural upscale lines. (By the way, you should always test one product at a time, and start by testing on your hand.)
Now, I’m not going to say here that natural necessarily means safe or great skin care. I’ve addressed this issue in organic skin care myths post.

But this stress on safety of natural and no such stress on all the other things that go on in skin care frankly bothers me.

Cause, you know, that PEG-Lead-Laurel-Paraben from the big brand company is SO MUCH BETTER FOR YOU. They are so safe and tested. And the dangerous things in small quantities are ok. Did the ladies who write this book actually do the math on how much these “small quantities” add up to if the routine of cleansing-washing-toning-creaming-foundationing-powdering-consealing-SPF-lipsticks-cleansing-washing-toning-nightcreaming routine that they are promoting?

There is also a section about what typically is included in skin care products. The list of categories includes preservatives (and I quote “included in this category are parabens and polysorbate 80”), dyes, fragrances, skin lighters, herbs, enzymes, humectants, etc… Guess which section asks you to use caution? Herbs! Yah… don’t worry about what’s in dyes and preservatives, but “use caution with herbal skin preparations”.

Hmm… (I’m not saying don’t use caution. But I think it’s a disservice to stress caution on herbs and be totally ok with dyes, parabens and prescription skin lighteners.) Just in case you didn’t realize that herbs are the riskiest ingredient in the mix, there is also a “caution” box warning you to phone your pharmacist to make sure they don’t interfere with anything you are taking. The only other caution box in the section is for paba in sunscreens, in case you are allergic to paba.

Oh, did I mention that there is a section called “Ingredients to Avoid”? Apparently you should only care about ingredients you are sensitive or allergic to. The only ingredient actually mentioned as something you might want to be careful with is lanolin…

For more perspective, here is what the book has to say about botox:

“Botox injections are seemingly a miracle …” and “Botox is purified botulinum bacteria. This is the same bacteria that causes a severe and often fatal form of food poisoning. The difference is that the botulinum bacteria in Botox are a purified form that won’t cause illness. It simply paralyzes certain muscles of the face.” (italics are mine)

No caution boxes, by the way. Cause you know, muscle paralysis is a totally normal thing. Your body can’t possibly object to it… Instead there is a Skin-spiration (meaning inspiration) box saying “If you choose to have botox injections, you could find that over time you break the habit of contracting the muscles in your face that cause wrinkles and expression lines.” (p. 296) Which is a skill you must be desperate to acquire. Especially if you intend to star in a Robocop remake.

Now given that this book promotes dry brushing and detoxification, I really can’t figure out where the authors are coming from. Seems like they are picking some ideas they think are “cool” and people expect to hear, but don’t follow them to logical conclusions. I would expect somebody who sais “toxins enter our bodies from air pollution, a wide variety of household-cleaning products, perfumes and bathing products, and even through laundry detergent” (p. 234) to support natural products, and not ditch them. But logic is probably too much to ask here.

Honestly, I think the Complete Idiot’s Guide has finally lived up to its brand name.