Articles and guides
Practical advice, ingredients and stories about solid cosmetics.
In-depth guides
Choose a topic and find practical answers.
Ingredient Atlas
Ingredient origins, textures and practical answers about cosmetic labels.
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Solid Cosmetics School
Practical lessons for using, storing and travelling with solid cosmetics.
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Which One? Comparison Studio
Clear comparisons for the cosmetics you use, the routines you enjoy and the gifts you give.
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Gift & Gifting Encyclopedia
300 articles about thoughtful gifts: people, occasions, traditions, beautiful presentation and words that feel like you.
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Body Cleansing Explained
Does your skin feel tight after the towel? Are you choosing a bar, or wondering where to put it when it’s wet? Start with the part of the shower you’d like to make easier.
Read the guideArticles: 1444
Ingredient Atlas
Horsetail extract
The little green bottlebrush at the edge of a field has a second, less familiar appearance in spring: short pale shoots topped with cones. Horsetail is a plant of joints,...
Ingredient Atlas
Niacinamide
A name that began in vitamin science now appears on everything from watery serums to solid face cleansers. Niacinamide’s most useful story is not a race for the biggest percentage....
Ingredient Atlas
Hops extract
A hop cone looks like a tiny green paper lantern. Inside, specialised glands produce a yellow resin, while above it the plant climbs by winding its whole stem around a...
Ingredient Atlas
Inulin
Before it becomes a pale cosmetic powder, inulin is part of a plant’s plan for next year. Chicory stores this carbohydrate below ground, ready for another season of growth. Follow...
Ingredient Atlas
Honey
Honey arrives with a familiar image: a golden ribbon falling from a spoon. Yet the interesting story is how it becomes that ribbon. Bees transform and concentrate a much more...
Ingredient Atlas
Hydrolyzed wheat protein
The stretch in bread dough and the slip in a conditioner begin with very different preparations of wheat. Follow the protein through separation and shortening, and the familiar grain becomes...
Ingredient Atlas
Hemp seed extract
A hemp plant can supply textile fibres from its stalk, edible hearts from its seeds and quite different materials from its flowers. The seed extract belongs to one specific branch...
Ingredient Atlas
Hydrolyzed rice protein
Rice can supply a crisp powder, a wax or a protein preparation, and each tells a different beauty story. Here the interesting part is the protein: prepared into smaller fragments...
Ingredient Atlas
Red-root gromwell extract
Small white flowers above the ground, deep purple-red colour below it: gromwell keeps its most striking feature out of sight. Its roots have a history in dyeing as well as...
Ingredient Atlas
Hydrolyzed milk protein
Milk has a quieter cosmetic story than the creamy image on a carton suggests. Separate its proteins, shorten their long chains, and you have a prepared care ingredient that can...
Ingredient Atlas
Betaine
A sugar beet can have a second career after the sugar-making process. One of its useful companions is betaine: a crystalline ingredient whose story is about water, comfort and giving...
Ingredient Atlas
Allantoin
Comfrey may introduce you to allantoin, but the ingredient arriving at a cosmetics workshop is a white crystalline powder. Its story connects a familiar plant with a surprisingly delicate question:...
