Category Archives: Essential Oils

Hinoki Oil – A Natural Cosmeceutical

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Hinoki Oil

Hinoki is well known in Japan

One of the good things about the job I do is that I come across interesting stuff all the time.  For example Hinoki Oil, which is the oil obtained from the leaves and roots of Chamaecyparis obtuse, Cupressaceae. The shrub from which it is derived is commonly known as either Hinoki or Hinoki Cyprus and is common in Japan. The wood from it is used to make incense sticks.  So it is something that is quite exotic to me, but presumably is commonplace in Japan. Continue reading →

Neroli

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Neroli

Neroli is an essential oil made from the petals of the bitter orange.  The amount of oil in a petal isn’t very high so it takes a lot of  them to make much oil.  So it isn’t surprising to learn that the use of neroli oil was originated by an aristocrat.  The production and use of neroli goes back to the Duchess of Nerola in seventeenth century Italy, whose exquisite taste and deep pockets led to her name being given to the oil.  Even today its stupendous price tag limits its use to very low levels or very expensive products. Continue reading →

Essential Oils Against Head Lice

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essential-oils-against-head-lice.jpg

Head lice are a recurrent problem all over the world. The lice are no respecters of income levels, general cleanliness and the degree of diligence of the child’s mother. The only thing they take notice of is effective anti-lice treatments. Even here, the laws of natural selection mean that what is effective one year might well be useless in the face of a new strain the following year. Continue reading →

Reactions to Plant Extracts in Cosmetics

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skin-reaction

This is what a patch test looks like.

Should you use natural products if you have sensitive skin?

There is an argument that you shouldn’t.  The problem is that an allergic reaction is caused by your immune system reacting to something that it encounters and identifies as a threat.  Natural products contain a wider diversity of ingredients so you have a bigger chance of one of them being something that will give you a problem. Continue reading →

Frankincense

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frankincense

Frankincense (thanks to Mamamusings on Flickr for image)

The tropical uplands of Somalia and the Yemen are a hard and unforgiving environment.  To survive there the Frankincense tree has had to develop some nifty abilities.  One of these is a thick resin that exudes from damaged parts of its trunk and branches. The sticky substance rapidly provides a defence against the teeth of hungry goats, and it later hardens into a solid protective plug to protect against germs and insects, and to stop the plant drying out in the arid conditions.

Nature is remarkable isn’t it.

The solidified lumps of resin are known as tears, and for centuries have been gathered by tribesmen to trade with.   In fact the frankincense trade is one of the oldest known with the trade route from the Horn of Africa to the Mediterranean having existed from prehistoric times to the present day.

Continue reading →