Homemade creams are easy, fun, bespoke to your needs & make great gifts. You don’t need special equipment and in the long-run you save money, yet have top quality skincare products tailored to your skin type & scented to your preference.

You can easily concoct creams to soothe sensitive skin, nourish & hydrate dry skin, or balance out combination skin. Also, you can play & make creams to address specific issues like wrinkles, or to provide relief from eczema & other skin conditions. Here are some I made earlier….(!)

Friends often ask me why did I start making my own skincare products when they are so readily available. Well here goes! I was finding that shop-bought skincare was making my skin sting & go red, especially after an intense gym workout (OUCH! Not the after burn I wanted!).

Upon further investigation of the constituent ingredients, I noticed that many commercial products contain additives from the petrochemical industry. YUK! No wonder i was reacting badly!

I also had friends with problems using commercial skincare products who wanted an effective & more natural alternative. e.g. friends avoiding parabens for health & fertility reasons, friends with skin conditions like eczema & a friend recovering from surgery who suffered from itchiness caused by the scar tissue. By altering the active ingredients, namely essential oils into my concoctions I have been fortunate enough to help. I therefore thought it useful to incorporate homemade skincare recipes into my site.

Some ingredients are not readily available on the High Street, but easy to get on line. I have provided hyperlinks to help you source them.

Equipment required for all cream types:

2 Pyrex glass jugs

2 big saucepans to accommodate the jugs to provide 2 hot water baths (2 bain marries!)

A handheld whisk

A thermometer

Containers to put the cream/ balm into. (I usually use sterilised mini jam jars, plastic containers, small metal pots & recycle these by sterilising jam jars in the oven (90C for 15mins) and using sterilising fluid for containers which are not heat-proof.

A typical moisturising cream recipe is as follows:

In one Pyrex jug melt all the fats together: plant derived emulsifying wax, shea or cocoa butter and  sweet almond oil, & rose hip oil. Remove from the heat and then add rosemary leaf extract, stirring gently to mix.

In the other Pyrex jug, add purified water, vegetable glycerine and grapefruit seed extract. Heat to 65C.

Then add to the melted oils over a low heat using a whisk. You will get a milky like liquid.

Remove from the heat & continue stirring until the mixture cools & starts to thicken. Then add the essential oils depending on what scent you like or what condition you are addressing. Lastly, pour into containers. Allow to cool before screwing on the lids. I like to label mine up with pretty stickers.

Don’t forget you can find my favourite recipes in my FREE eBook here.

I regularly make my own Rose and Immortelle Cream

Immortelle is also known as everlasting flower as it grows in the arid oils of the Mediterranean, yet never wilts. It’s oil promotes cell renewal & has super anti-inflammatory & anti-allergic properties, so it is excellent for not just sensitive, but also dry skin conditions like eczema & dermatitis.

(Note, immortelle is the oil used in a high end cream with a yellow logo! Make this at a fraction of the price!).

Here is a useful guide to what oils to add:

Skin type or condition:

All or normal: chamomile, geranium, jasmine, lavender, neroli, patchouli, rosewood, ylang ylang.

Oily: Cedarwood, bergamot, cypress, geranium, juniper, lavender, lemon, lime, mandarin, orange, tangerine, ylang.

Dry: Jasmine, lavender, patchouli, rose, sandalwood.

Combination: geranium, lavender, neroli, sandalwood, ylang ylang.

Sensitive: German chamomile, jasmine, lavender, neroli, rose, rosewood.

Dehydrated: rose, rosewood, sandalwood.

Mature: carrot seed, frankincense, jasmine, lavender, myrrh, patchouli.

Acne-prone: bergamot, cedarwood, clary sage, cypress, ecucalyptus, geranium, German chamomile, graipfruit, juniper, lavender, lemon, myrrh, patchouli, pine, Roman chamomile, tee-tree, thyme.

Dull skin: grapefruit, lemongrass, peppermint, rosemary, vetiver.

Dermatitis/ Eczema: German chamomile, lavender, myrrh, patchouli, sandalwood, ylang ylang.

Broken capillaries: Blue chamomile, geranium, lemon, rose.

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