July/August 2020 Skincare Discoveries
Its amazing isn’t it? We are reaching towards the second half of 2020. As I look back as to how the first half of 2020 has come along – its been a big year for myself, both personally and professionally – in the best way of course! I feel like I have personally achieved and learnt so much about myself, about people, about how small beauty businesses operate and overall have a new appreciation of brands but also the boutiques that carry them. I’ve learnt that its not as glamorous as it may seem and there is a lot of effort that goes behind the scenes, many sleepless nights and a lot of gold old fashioned hard work. The final product however is incredibly satisfying and so very rewarding that all of the hardships are tiny in comparison to what owners of these brands and boutiques achieve. Its amazing to see the success of these businesses, and to think they all started with an idea and the belief that they could make a difference.
In doing this month’s edition of Skincare Discoveries, each and every girlboss/entrepreneur has found something missing in their world and brought that idea to life. These amazing women took that leap of faith in creating their own brand, their own ethos, their own philosophy. Spending hours upon hours in everything from research, marketing, sourcing and everything else that comes with the creative and business aspect of their own brand. It’s amazing to think that many of the brands featured here and other that we all often love are all started on an idea and a leap of faith.
Ranavat Botanics
Ranavat Botanics is a relatively brand new (okay its a SUPER new) skincare brand founded by Michelle Ranavat, a mother of 2 who was born in the US but is of Indian heritage. Ranavat Botanics uses Michelle’s Indian roots, the life lessons taught to her by her parents and a general love for ingredients to create this unique skincare range.
Growing up, Michelle reminisces, “we traveled very often back to India and I always felt a very strong bond with India”. With her mother an interior designer and her father a chemist, Michelle found out she loved the best of both her parents worlds. “I always loved both Math/Science and also Style/Design – but never felt like the two could go together. I studied Industrial Engineering in college and have a masters degree in Engineering Management, but found myself on Wall Street working in Investment Banking after college” says Michelle. It was only after the global financial crisis that Michelle started to piece things together, as to how she can draw upon her passions and take the plunge to be a successful entrepreneur. “Watching my dad build his business growing up, left a huge impression on me and I always knew I wanted to create something. It was not until my mother in law (an esthetician) discovered that Ayurvedic treatments helped her hyperpigmentation, that I saw both of these passions in my life come together at once. That moment was less than a year ago, and since we have traveled to 4 cities in India, developed 6 products and are on the cusp of launching” Michelle tells me.
So what is the Ranavat line entail exactly? Ranavat Botanics is an apothecary based line formulated with 3 powerful powder masques to be brought to life with 3 pure hydrosols. Michelle goes on to explain, “All the masques and hydrosols can be mixed and matched to combine different healing properties and allow for customization with each and every treatment. The powder masque allows for a very fresh and personalized spa-like ritual”. This ritual is what the brand often refers to as the “Royal Ritual”, whereby allowing one to experience self care, like Indian Royalty and remind us that what we put on our skin does impact our wellbeing. Michelle adds, “The Indian Royals were obsessed with living eternally! They had the best access to the most luxurious and fresh flowers and herbs and spent their days being pampered”.
The range is due to launch later this month, with the first launch being beautiful masques and hydrosols based on 5000 years of Indian history and tradition stemming from the Indian Royal families. In the later months of the year, do watch out for 3 saffron infused beauty elixirs. As Michelle tells me “Ranavat Botanics is truly about sharing something unique with the world. Each and every ingredient has a story – some are hand-picked in the mountains of the Himalayas (lavender) and others are flowers that bloom only once a year for a few weeks (Saffron). So while you may have experienced some of these ingredients before—ours are different”.
Ranavat Botanics launches later this month, but sign up for updates on their website here.
Supermood
Supermood is a skincare brand of Finnish descent, the brain child of Anne Kukkohovi, who is renowned in the Finnish fashion and entertainment industry. Having started her career as a model and later as the host of the Finnish version of Next Top Model, she found herself coming across plenty of different beauty products that promised miracles for the skin but failed to look at great skin as being part of a well rounded holistic process. She believes that each piece of the puzzle is as important as the other and that no serum can make the skin look amazing unless we take care of ourselves in every aspect – eating right, plenty of sleeping and overall living a healthy lifestyle.
What makes Supermood different from many other brands in the beauty industry is that it sees beauty as an all-round holistic process, where physical and emotional well-being goes hand in hand with each other and are directly reflected in the way we look on the outside. Due to this belief, the range does not only offer skincare products but also wellbeing products ranging from dietary supplements to ‘healthy’ chocolate. Its a really refreshing take on beauty and something that I am starting to see a little more from brands now – skincare is not just a healthy fix but it compliments our lifestyle choices.
The foundation of the Supermood product line is that there are three product lines that will correspond with a specific emotional state rather than focus on ‘anti-ageing’, ‘sensitive skin’ etc. The EgoBoost line used when we need to ‘shine at our brightest’ or in other words the day time. The range is supposed to work rapidly to make your skin noticeably tighter immediately after applying the product, giving us the extra bit of confidence to face the day. The main ingredients of the EgoBoost line are Finnish Chaga and the natural Liftonin Xpress compound. Chaga is a mushroom/fungus that grows on Arctic trees and is loaded with antioxidants. It has been used for centuries as a remedy for rejuvenating skin, brightening the skin and helping with pigmentation. Beauty Sleep is a range of products to be used just before we say goodnight, allowing us to look well rested and radiant in the morning. The secret behind this? Each of the Beauty Sleep products contain a premium sea fennel stem cell extract which helps improve the look and feel of your skin – leaving it feeling renewed in the morning. Using calming herbal ingredients to help unwind the mind at night, the Beauty Sleep range allows the skin cells effectively repair themselves by boosting the production of collagen, destroying harmful free radicals, and rectify cell damage. Finally, Youth Glo is the perfect solution for those moments where the skin needs a little pick me up. Focused mainly on peeling, the products contain natural fruit acids that renew the skin by peeling off old skin cells, whilst moth bean extract, a natural alternative to retinol known for its potent effects in reducing signs of aging, work to fill up existing fine lines and prevent new wrinkles from appearing. Youth Glo also contains glutathione,a powerful antioxidant that will help to create a beautiful, healthy sparkle.
Together the three moods form an ecosystem, where all the products complement each other to balance physical and emotional well-being. Supermood products allow you to always be at your best, no matter what mood you are in.
Supermood is available at Amazon, it is also available on the Supermood website here.
Purearth
Image Source: Purearth
Purearth is a brand that is deeply rooted in Ayurveda, the ancient Indian science and philosophies based on the idea of balance in bodily systems. Aryuveda uses diet, herbal treatment and yogic breathing for healing and harnesses the potency of wild harvested herbs, seeds, roots, leaves and flowers to help the mind and body seek balance and harmony. With ingredients sourced and gathered at soaring altitudes of the Himalayas, Purearth is a skincare brand with a conscience, it is an artisanal skincare and wellness brand, which equally values the ingredients, maker and the consumer.
Founder of Purearth and social entrepreneur, Kavita Khosa has built a beauty brand that supports exceptional, pure ingredients that are harnessed at the peak of their potency and are sourced responsibly. In an interview with Freja, Kavita says that she is an advocate of the mantra “Doing well by doing good” or “Doing good by doing well”. It is this philosophy that forms the cornerstone of how Purearth operates as a business. She says “The social welfare of our workers is as important for us as the financial success of the business. There can be no compromise for a social entrepreneur when it comes to fair trade wages, income independence for its workforce, a vested interest in their welfare beyond the employee/supplier relationship and ethical, sustainable sourcing of raw materials”. Purearth is proud that their ingredients are sustainable soured from the beautiful Himalayas and are even prouder that they are able to support women self help groups and marginalised producers. The brand is also proud to be able to offer assistnace to their Purepurpose Program. This program is so important to Purearth as it focused on the sustainability of the planet by supporting biodynamic and organic farming methods, carbon offsets and reforestation and also the world’s people by building alliances that bridge inequalities in gender and pricing in urban markets.
Before Pureath, Kavita had a degree in Law and was working as a Director of the Deutsche Bank. It was when she took a trip to Tibet and later to Himachal and Uttarakhand in the Himalayas that she become deeply moved by the beauty, deep spirituality and the simplicity of the people in the area. It was here where Kavita decided to leave behind the world of private equity law and spend a year travelling around the Himalayas. It was at this crossroad that she immersed herself not only in the flora and botanical plants around her but also the passion to start an organization that can help provide a sustainable, fair means of income to marginalized women and marginalised producer groups. From this ideal, Purearth was born combining quality, wildcrafted ingredients and social responsibility.
It is these beliefs that make Purearth such an incredibly unique skincare brand with ingredients that are not only wild harvested or cultivated ecologically but also come from the remote high-altitude Himalayan valleys and villages. Each of these ingredients are harvested by hand from the Himalayan glacier-fed terrains and mineral-rich uncontaminated forest soil. Going back to basics, ingredients are often pounded in “okhlis” and flowers are steam distilled in a wood fired factory free workshop. The traditional Indian “ghani” cold press technique is instrumental in extracting their incredible oils such as rosehip, sea buckthorn and apricot kernal oil. Using such pure and high quality ingredients, simple extraction methods and time honoured formulations is what Purearth prides itself on.
To experience the beautiful Purearth range, click for their website here.
Amy Erbacher
Image Source: Amy Erbacher.com
Based in Sydney, Australia, Amy Erbacher is a practising skin health and wellness expert, she is a qualified Beauty therapist, a skilled clinical Aromatherapist and Life Coach in training. She is considered to be an authority on the world of skin wellbeing and has 3 Sydney based Skin and Health Wellness Studios. It is in these studios and being around clients constantly that Amy has gained invaluable knowledge of a clients wants and needs in the area of skincare products and education.
Before Amy became involved in the wellness industry, she had established career in media being a model from the age of 15. This opened the world of oppurtunity and Amy became a television presenter working for Network 10, For Sports, Foxtel and FOX 8. Amy’s career in media nearly ruined her, on her website she is quoted saying, “I was a woman who suffered from negative self-image. I would see a distorted mental picture of myself. Today we call this body dysmorphic disorder. My own personal beliefs about myself, along with my past experiences lead me to believe that I wasn’t enough”. When she hit rock bottom, she went on a journey of self discovery and self love which has inevitably lead her to where she is now with her Skin and Health Wellness Studios and a newly launched skincare line – the skinCLEANSEsystem.
Amy explains “The skinCLEANSEsystem is a labour of love, following many years of treating clients from my Sydney skin studio.” She goes on to say “Finally I can share my broad education and treatment ethos with a wider range of women and men who are seeking superior skin health.” Having seen firsthand the amazing changes that can occur in the complexion when a simple approach is adopted with her own loyal customers, Amy created and shaped the skinCLEANSEsystem. She believes that this range answers the needs that aren’t being met in the current market, as the 4 part system is a family of products that is formulated to bring the skin back to basics and show beautiful skin at its very best.
The skinCLEANSEsystem is like a detox system, whereby the products in the range work to provide the skin a gentle and gradual detox that helps the skin heal and helps to reintroduce the concept of less is more in skincare. The skinCLEANSEsystem contains three different collections which aid in three common skin types – Dry /Mature, Oily and Normal/Combination. Each collection contains 4 carefully formulated products that are not only straight forward in terms of use but are also formulated with naturally derived ingredients that are gentle and results-driven. Over the course of using the skinCLEANSEsystem, the skin will experience a strengthened and supported barrier function, a vibrant complexion and most importantly sustained skin health, which is the foundation to better looking skin. Amy says, “Through the simple – but thorough – skinCLEANSEsystem, your complexion will remain balanced and revitalized for the long-term.”
Find more about Amy Erbacher, her skincare line and her Skin and Wellness Clinics here.
Have you come across any of these brands before? When you look at new brands, what interests you? I would love to find out more so please leave a comment in the comments section below!