THE FUTURE OF SKIN IS BALMY
Some skin care is game changing
Then, occasionally, there are products that change EVERYTHING. Every. Single. Thing.
These are the two balms that have changed everything for me, by two brands changing everything in the skin care industry. Two brands who are forging new paths, showing us that there are other ways to have our best skin at every age; that there is another way to tend and care for our skin and open new spaces for us to feel the full beauty of our selves just as we are {not as we’re told we should be}.
Two balms by my two favourite brands - and I am one discerning, selective {read: S U P E R fussy} plant based facialist.
Both are, what I like to call, soil to oil brands {Laurel Whole Plant Organics prefers ‘Seed to Bottle’; AS APOTHECARY ‘Seed to Serum’}. Which means they plant, gather, harvest, distill, press, infuse and blend their own ingredients into individually outstanding products. Integrity and ethics are high {the highest possible} permeating through each product. Philosophies so unique and authentic and at odds with the heavy handed and all-controlling, mass produced mainstream skin care industry {which is built almost solely on commercially driven synthetics, quick fixes and false promises} that it seems almost impossible for such beacons to rise up and shine a new way through. But they do. With love, grace and success.
GOING BALMY
These are the balms that I trialed in 2018 and transformed my own skin. That when I took them into my whole plant treatment room elevated my clients skin health dramatically as well as adding another layer of transportive aroma therapeutics to the facial and deeper dimensions of tissue healing.
Honestly, I had been a little hesitant to try balms. I mean, I know I’m a little late to the balm party and I’m not sure why. The science behind them makes so much sense so why was I dragging my feet? I think there were two reasons my reluctance:
1. I have been so in love with whole plants, oils and aromatic waters and the beautiful skin they deliver I just didn’t feel the need to introduce another layer.
2. The balms I have tried previously were NOTHING like these balms, nothing at all. My previous experience with balms was not great; I found that they were heavy, clawing, almost suffocating to the skin. However, balms by these two brands are the polar opposite being instead comforting, permeable, supportive and utterly transformative.
Now I am ALL about these balms. Balmy about them actually!
Here I share my own personal interpretations of them but strongly recommend you explore each balm yourself. You and your skin will benefit from having both to hand for your daily skin care rituals.
Each balm is very different; in ingredients, intention, effect & brand but equal in their individual wholeness, healing & skin love.
I recommend massaging one balm as the last layer of your evening skin ritual; in the daytime they make the perfect, silky, smooth base for make up. Both will effectively ‘seal in’ the plant products without, in any way, ‘sealing in’ skin. This helps to support the skin’s slower and more effective absorption of nutrients and ensuring skin is nourished in ways it needs.
Both are best applied to freshly hydrated skin {spritz or roll and press aromatic water into skin and follow with face oil before applying balm} but can be applied to the skin at any time. I’ve been known to use as eye balm, lip soother and general full face pick-me-up on my own skin during long days in the treatment room. I´ll use as a base when I have a little time to do a quick Gua She between clients, or massage in a little extra very last thing at night after my initial evening skin care ritual has sunk in.
Both make beautiful masques and I use thicker layers as such on clients before removing with warm, herb infused steam cloths. Professionally, a tiny touch of balm provides a the perfect combination of great resistance, with just enough slip, for deeper massage work such as connective tissue and intra-oral techniques.
However you decide to use your balm they will deliver an instant skin boost, love and importantly - G L O W -
Earthy, herbal and grounding.
This is the balm that I feel puts me back together again.
Healing Balm takes all the fragments of my unraveled self and makes me whole. Bringing me home. It re-roots me to the core of my authentic self. Skin is supported on a deep cellular level, allowing for a restoration of health and harmony. Soul is soothed.
When the pressures of daily life build and I feel my body beginning to take the brunt of the stress, Healing Balm cools and calms the visual “gift-tellings” of this stress that can manifest on my skin. It is the only product I’ve ever found to almost instantly heal the Perioral dermatitis that appears at the corners of my mouth to externally signal imbalances within. This usually means that my diet has slipped - more often into an emotional reliance of too much bread {tea and toast being my favourite comfort food}. Whilst I get my gut back on track I have previously had to resort to using pharmaceutical creams out of desperation and as a last resort to help my skin but even these took some time to help ease the flakiness and irritated redness (erythema). Healing Balm instantly soothes both erythema and flaky irritation.
In the treatment room I have used Healing Balm with great effect on all grades of acne and rosacea, where it is an outstanding inflammatory moderator providing refreshing relief to the irritation that can come from these often distressing skin conditions.
I also use Healing Balm on stagnant and stuck skin; those who have run a ground in their sense of identity. Where life has moved on but they haven’t; where someone is almost drowning in their old sense of self and they’re too afraid to let go of that familiar version and shift into new soils. When inner emotional transformation is painful and it’s easier to bury ourselves in unhealthy habits and distractions.
I feel Healing Balm both stimulates surface fluids with strong eliminating effects whilst also soothing deep within; which is why I feel it to have an overall Yin action on the body. A quiet, slow, internal, transformative action providing solace for even the most challenging skins.
YIN {surface elimination and release with a concurrent drawing inwards}
COOLING
SOOTHING
INSTANTLY CALMING
TONIC
THERAPEUTIC
INGREDIENTS -as listed by Laurel Whole Plant Organics-
Full Ingredient List: Shea Butter*, Tamanu Oil*, Olive Oil*, Jojoba Oil*, Pomegrante Oil*, Rosemary Extract*, house made extracts of Calendula*, Comfrey*, Lavender*, Yarrow*, Marshmallow*, Self Heal*, essential oils of Lavender*, Lemon Balm*, Helichrysum*
*signifies organic
In brief Lavender, Lemon Balm, Marshmallow and Yarrow all have refreshingly cooling herbal actions.
Calendula is a powerful wound healer with a real affinity to the skin, bitter tonic to open channels of elimination and gentle lymph remedy with real “oomph” {as my Mum would say}. Calendula helps to really shift lymphatic congestion creating flow and movement. Calendula is known for being warming and drying, having a draining and drawing effect on the fluid metabolism.
As with all aromatherapy it is the synergy of the oils, the alchemy of their merging and blending that creates a further therapeutic effect. These herbs chosen by Laurel to be held in careful combination of butters and oils to nourish and ease.
Laurel is the formulator and founder of Laurel Whole Plant Organics.
Not only is Laurel one of the most talented blenders in the skin care industry today but she is also one of the most beautiful, compassionate, centred and loving souls I have had the privilege to meet. This energy and ancestrally connected wisdom flows through her products and into your skin. Laurel Whole Plant Organics products are more than simply skin care, they are medicine. Like this Healing Balm.
Sweet, luxurious and luminous.
This is tissue rejuvenation which transports us to our inner wildness with potent oils blended into the softest perfume.
Reminiscent of the unguents from times long ago this balm is soft yet heady. Floral yet not at all sickly. Instead quite the opposite being warm, fresh and lifting.
Think sweet and spicy, heart soothing, skin restoring Rosa damascene carried on gentle breeze through a pine forest. Honeyed amber with hints of woody undertones combined with the syrupy, nectar of resinous Labdanum that pierce with a deep comfort right into the heart of the soul.
The golden luminosity of this silky balm is translated directly into the skin.
Every, single time I massage this into clients skin during facials {or my own skin every morning and night} it feels as if I am anointing an ancient, luxurious recipe of self healing. There is wisdom and power to this balm weighted with the therapeutics and fragrance of oils that transverse time and space.
To me it conjures up the cones that the Eygptians would place on their Crown chakras which would melt, scent permitting the the hair, skin and air with their perfume; the painting of which are the origins of our contemporary ideas of halos and Wild Beauty Balm Concentrate #30 certainly feels heavenly to the skin.
Unguent from the Latin unguentum meaning ‘ointment’
I feel Wild Beauty Balm Concentrate #30 to be a subtle, supportive stimulant to the skin in the sense that is releases stagnations, helping to get our fluid tissue (blood, lymph, interstitial etc.) moving and flowing. It may be gently stimulating but it has an immense, accumulative power that is seen quickly as the skin which soon becomes plump, fresh and radiant.
It allows us to move into our own beauty again, to rediscover those parts of our self which have been put to one side and as we massage this balm into our face, neck and décolleté it feels as if we are consecrating our skin with plant nourishment and perfume we have been seeking for a long time.
YANG {pulls us out of ourselves and back into our own beauty and radiance}
STIMULATES
BRIGHTENS
NOURISHES
SOFTENS
INGREDIENTS -as listed by AS APOTHECARY-
Jojoba Simmondsia chinensis, Beeswax Cera alba, Rosehip oil Rosa canina fruit oil, MESTO EV Olive oil Olea europea, Almond oil Prunus amygdalus oil, Hemp Seed oil Cannabis sativa seed oil, Argan oil Argania spinosa kernel, Calendula oil Calendula officinalis, Borage oil Borago seed oil, Black Seed oil Nigella sativa seed oil, Pomegranate oil Punica granatum seed oil, Vitamin E Tocopheryl, Essential oils: Rose Rosa damascena, Sweet Gale Myrica gale, Labdanum Cistus ladaniferus, Pine Pinus sylvestris, Lavender Lavandula angustifolia
Amanda is at the helm of AS APOTHECARY. Director and alchemist of this UK based small batch distillery.
Plant gatherer and master bender of herbs, homeopathy and the medicine of the land, Amanda is also a talented natural perfumer. Her wisdom, skill and light are infused into AS APOTHECARY. Amanda is personal inspiration to me as a plant based facialist.
IN MY TREATMENT ROOM
You will find select products from both of these outstandingly beautiful brands in my treatment room, including these two beautiful balms which are incorporated into your facial as appropriate.
REMINDER
Both balms, combining the science and magic of plants for skin health and soul healing, are the perfect mediums for Gua Sha and intra-oral massage. Especially at the final layer of a whole plant skin ritual of aromatic waters {to hydrate}, oils {to nourish} and finally the balms to seal and heal.
Please note these are my personal interpretations of these two balms.
This is not a sponsored post. It is authentic love for two products which have been tried, tested and proven to be very special indeed.
Have you tried these balms? What are your thoughts on them?
Do you have any other favourite balms?
Let me know.
With love,
Fiona xx
References
https://www.laurelskin.com/product/healing-balm-face-body/
http://www.asapoth.com/mature/wild-beauty-balm-concentrate-30