January is the month of fresh starts. We cleanse, detox, write resolutions and sign up for Pilates memberships. In this time of heightened selfcare, we also owe it to ourselves to examine WHAT we are putting on our bodies. So, CLn Skin Care’s blog will devote all of our posts in the month of January to making helpful, healthy suggestions for selfcare. To begin our series, we’re diving into the skin care product ingredients you could be using everyday without being aware they are animal-derived.
Understanding Skin Care Ingredients
For skin conscious shoppers with strong convictions about animal-based products, it can be challenging to interpret every word on the back of a bottle. The labels “cruelty-free,” “animal-friendly,” and “vegan” are helpful, but decoding the rest of the list isn’t always as straightforward. So, the first step to understanding skin care product contents is educating yourself on what miracle ingredients are animal, plant, or synthetic-based.
Common Animal-based Skin Care Ingredients
Although the following ingredients may have a familiar ring, you might not know their origin. If the choice to utilize only vegan products is best for you, look for these ingredients on the label. And keep shopping for alternatives if you see them listed!
Tallow
Rendered from animal fat, tallow is a popular solution for repairing broken down skin cells. It is found in moisturizers and other cosmetics and is a source of omega 3’s, vitamin C, and vitamin E.
Collagen
Often thought of as the ultimate anti-aging ingredient, collagen is a protein extracted from animal tissue. You’ll see collagen listed on moisturizers and lip-plumping glosses.
Retinol
Also an anti-aging ingredient, retinol is bursting with vitamin A. It is commonly extracted from fish and animal products. Look for it listed on face and eye creams.
Lanolin
A super hydrating product, lanolin is the purified sebum excreted from wool-producing animals. You can find it in products ranging from nursing balms to skin creams to shampoos.
Plant-based Alternatives
If you’re hoping to avoid animal-based ingredients in your skin care products, rule out any product containing the above ingredients. Instead, look for plant-based ceramides.
What are ceramides? They’re the waxy lipid molecules that occur naturally in your skin and in many other living things. In other words, they’re the glue protecting your skin from unwanted microorganisms and helping it to retain moisture. Over time, your skin can lose natural lipids in many ways–age, drying products, and other environmental factors. This is where moisturizers containing plant-based or synthetic ceramides come in.
Ceramides in Moisturizers
Not all ceramides are plant or synthetic based, but those used in CLn Facial Moisturizer are.
The ceramides used in CLn Facial Moisturizer are a unique concentrate consisting of a mixture of skin-identical long-chain ceramides and short-chain ceramides, vegetable-based cholesterol and behenic acid also from a vegetable base. Using advanced technology, the ceramide building blocks (phytosphingosine and sphingosine) are produced by a fermentative process, which yields the skin-identical ceramide stereochemistry.
For your reference, the table below lists the plant & synthetic-based ceramides used in our products, and in many other products as well:
1. Ceramide NP: vegetable/microbial
2. Ceramide NS: vegetable/microbial
3. Ceramide EOS: vegetable/synthetic/microbial
4. Ceramide EOP: vegetable/synthetic/microbial
5. Ceramide AP: vegetable/synthetic/microbial
How we make choices about the products we use is intricately tied to our own personal values. Although animal-based products can be effective, they don’t fall within selfcare guidelines for some people. Jamie Lyons, a Dallas stylist, explains her decision to only use vegan products. “…So much of what you put on your skin is absorbed into your body. If I’m taking steps to make sure my diet is free from animal products and anything else that contains chemicals, toxins, and preservatives, then I need to make sure the products I’m using are free of these things as well. Ethically, I love that by purchasing vegan products, I’m not supporting animal testing or cruelty.”
CLn Skin Care is happy to be among the list of brands providing effective plant and synthetic-based products to our customers. And we never test on animals. We wish everyone a very healthy, happy New Year. Stay tuned to our blog for more healthy topics in January.
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