Treatments based on cold-pressed fruit juice and vegetables and the detox obsession have triggered new initiatives in beauty. As is often and more and more the case, cosmetics seize food trends opportunities. An increasing number of brands consider that if it is good to eat, it is good for the skin.
That is what aptly-named Fresh does (an American company purchased by LVMH). The lifestyle brand following Kiehl’s footsteps has put an emphasis on edible ingredients since 1993, with soya, sake, rice, brown sugar, or black tea… Here are their next creations to be released in January: Anti-Pollution Essence with Kombucha black tea, a fermented tea that is close to probiotics, according to co-founder Lev Glazman (150ml, €58), and Masque Pro-Jeunesse SOS for the Face with Lotus (SOS Pro-Youth Mask, 100ml, €57). Well, of course, here it is more about marketing than ‘real’ fresh cosmetics, but it is hard not to talk about Fresh in an article actually dealing with this theme…

Cosmetics upon request & formulated on a just-in-time basis

Let’s get a bit more serious, now. Nuori, a young Danish brand created in 2015 by a former L’Oréal employee, has decided to affix the dates of creation on all their products, which are also formulated without any preservatives. The brand started from a simple observation: there can be more than thirty months between a product’s date of manufacturing and the moment it ends up on store shelves. The cosmetics industry has spent millions for years to prolong products’ shelf-lives – a great part of Research & Development work is dedicated to this. And yet, when you know that vitamins (and not just them) are very unstable by nature and lose their properties in just a few months, you do feel like having a closer look at the dates! And studying the issue of longevity and stocks a bit more in depth…
From formulation to production, ultra-protective packaging, and distribution, Nuori has redesigned it all to optimize product freshness. The production in Denmark is renewed every 12 weeks. By shortening the chain, they preserve the quality of the actives contained in their 14 skincare products (face & body). All products are manufactured in small quantities. Rich in vitamins, amino acids, and essential fatty acids, they exhibit perfect affinity with the skin and the results are most satisfactory. Less than a week after being manufactured, the products are delivered at Oh My Cream (10 stores in Paris and throughout France, plus an e-shop), the only distributor for now. They can last up to nine months.
The latest Nuori creations include Vital Foaming Cleanser, a cleansing foam with pomegranate enzymes and black winter radish and oats extracts which removes impurities and makeup without altering the skin’s barrier (100ml, €28), Supreme-C Traitement Vitamine C (Vitamin C Supreme-C Treatment (2 x 10ml, €110), Vital Face Cream (30ml, €65), and Vital Unifier Mist with Aloe Vera, based on hyaluronic acid and vitamins (150ml, €42).

Battle for freshness

Freshness requires much logistics management, which is possible through online selling or in laboratory-stores like La Boté, created by Pharmacist PhD Lucile Battail. Here, you can see a tailor-made face care product made live (from €55 for a 50ml night cream to €85 for a 30ml serum) and prepared with clean, healthy ingredients. After a thorough skin diagnosis designed by dermatologists, you choose the texture, perfume, and even the packaging colour! Then, you can watch your own product being manufactured in the laboratory part of the store, following a patented eco-friendly process. And it is easy to order it again if you want to: two clicks online will do.
Last innovation: La Boté now offers a tailor-made makeup-removing/cleansing oil designed according to the skin profile (Beauty Wave, Floral Infusion with fresh plant petals, 100ml, €28). Preservative-free, it contains several vegetable oils (camellia oil…), vegetable extracts (green tea, hibiscus, magnolia…), and – real – rose and cornflower petals that also convey this freshly-harvested beauty.

Ringana, a new Austrian brand which has developed the So Fresh range distributed online, can also be characterized by the absence of stock, the quality of the components and their immediate treatment. Free from any preservatives, solvents, or stabilizers, these vegan products are formulated at the last minute and packaged without any case. The bottles are prettily wrapped – and protected – in small organic cotton towels – an ingenious idea. Such freshness is only possible because everything is done on the same site in Hartberg, Austria, from product design to shipping (once you have placed your order online, the products are delivered in Europe in one to five days).
Other creations include an Anti-Wrinkle Serum (30ml, €60.80), a Crème Concentrée 4 for extremely dry skins (50ml, €54.40), and an Eye Serum with a horse chestnut extract, Q10 coenzyme, and ectoin (30ml, €38). There is also an exclusive Teeth Oil (125ml, €12.20), derived from the gandoosha (oil pulling) Ayurvedic tradition (ritual mouthwash with vegetable oil). It completely replaces toothpaste by confining the bacteria in the oral cavity.

Our skin has the right to get food through short distribution channels!

Lastly, Romy offers – online, again – Cures Fraîches (10 single doses of fresh treatment, €80) containing fresh actives to be kept in the fridge. ‘These cures are like beauty shots which completely revive the skin by resetting its metabolism. Their nutrients are even more beneficial, since they were not drowned in formulas overdosed with preservatives,’ the brand claims. After their device (Figure, €790; you can now rent it for €59 per month), a sort of mini formulation laboratory, the brand keeps working on ‘living skincare’.

Ariane Le Febvre