Which Natural Face Wash for Sensitive Skin?
As it happens, there are many products in the market that are superb for sensitive skin.
Natural skincare keeps thriving and more and more companies are making an effort in coming up with excellent natural products.
It was difficult for me to choose a winner since all the products listed here are of excellent quality. I’ll discuss below what makes a good face wash for sensitive skin and I’ll go through each and every product in detail.
I don’t try these products as I make my own natural skincare but I do like to spot skincare brands that deserve a mention in OhMightyHealth. I check ingredients (and hey, sometimes I like to emulate some of the formulas if I fall in love with them!) so please note that I have NOT TRIED the products below. I’m going by the ingredients the brands have used to create the products. As they taught me in Formula Botanica: The ingredients are the product!
My Chosen Products
The below are my chosen products: two for all skin types and the third one for people over 40 (or those who feel they need to start taking care of lines and appearance of wrinkles).
[ALL AGES] Christina Moss Naturals Facial Cleanser Made with Organic & Natural Ingredients
As I make natural skincare and get to know people ‘by skin type‘ I realise there’s so much more to ‘sensitive skin’ than just sensitivity. There’s sensitive and dry, sensitive and acne, sensitive and oily, sensitive with rosacea, sensitive with eczema, very sensitive skin and at times a mix a match of all of the mentioned.
So there’s a lot more to sensitive skin other than sensitivity.
No doubt that not having harsh ingredients in your products will most definitely help. “Natural” and “organic” not always means sensitive-friendly. You must read the ingredients and make sure that 1) they’re gentle ingredients but also that 2) you’re not allergic to any of them. It would be a bonus if on top of this you could also recognise particular ingredients that are good for your type of skin (each skin is individual). For example, prone to acne? If the product has jojoba oil it’ll be better than if it has avocado oil in it. And so on.
Christina Moss Naturals’ brand has a great reputation and it is most definitely a customers’ favourite so let’s see what makes this particular product oh so very special.
Let’s have a look at the ingredients list:
Decyl Glucoside, Certified Organic Cocos Nucifera (Coconut) Oil, Certified Organic Olea Europaea (Olive) Fruit Oil, Certified Organic Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil, Potassium Hydroxide (this is removed in the final product through the process of Saponification), Certified Organic Aloe Barbadensis Leaf (Aloe Vera) Juice, Citric Acid, Certified Organic Butyrospermum Parki (Shea Butter), Certified Organic Rosmarinus Officials (Rosemary) Essential Oil, Rosmarius Officianalis (Rosemary) Flower Extract.
Not sure why the shea butter has been added to the product since it already has a great emollient like olive oil but I love shea butter and can appreciate why companies have it as a favourite ingredient.
Overall, I can see this is a simple (very simple) liquid soap based cleanser and similar to the one I make at home (which I totally love, by the way). I’m missing some vegetable glycerin here (which would act as a humectant). This product features mainly a natural cleansing agent (decyl glucoside) with added oils (so the product won’t leave your skin dry after use): coconut oil, olive oil and sunflower oil (particularly gentle on sensitive skin). The added aloe vera will be helpful to those with acne or acne scars and aloe is also a great anti-inflammatory agent. Some people are allergic to aloe vera so be aware. In terms of the rest of the ingredients, there’s an emphasis on rosemary (having added both the essential oil and the flower extract) which is interesting, but being this a face wash I can see why, since rosemary is antibacterial. Rosemary EO is also good for focusing your mind so this product is a great start to your morning routine!
What can I say – I love this product. As mentioned before, it is very similar to the facial wash I make which my friends and family ADORE and I’ll be taking on board one or two ideas from here to incorporate into my product. Well done Christina Moss Naturals!
Christina Moss Naturals Facial Cleanser
[amazon box=”B00FZESMKG”]
[ALL AGES] Era Organics Natural Moisturizing Face Wash
Era Organics always manages to make it to this site.
Heavier on aloe vera in comparison with Christina Moss Naturals product featured above, I feel this product is a bit similar to Eavara’s cleanser (featured below) having in common the cocamidropropyl betaine, xantham gum, tapioca starch, organic aloe and cellulose gum, which is quite a few ingredients.
Let’s check out the entire list of ingredients:
Organic Aloe Barbadensis Gel (Aloe Vera), Cocamidopropyl Betaine (derived from Coconut), Organic Glycerin, Leptospermum Scoparium Mel (Manuka Honey), Tocobiol (Vitamin E), Cehami (Centipeda Cunninghamii), Gluconolactone, Sodium Benzoate, Sodium Hyaluronate, Manihot Esculenta (Tapioca) Starch, Cellulose Gum, Xanthan Gum, Mica, Titanium Dioxide, Iron Oxide.
I like the addition of manuka honey as a humectant which they’ve also added on top of the organic glycerin. Manuka honey is an antibacterial, always good when it comes to cleansing products (aka the rosemary essential oil and flower extract above).
This is a gentle product that will not only cleanse due to the natural cleansing agent added but it will also help with moisture. I’m not keen on mica because although it is harmless I find that adding colour to a products is a little pointless in my view. I can’t say why they’ve added the mica to this product so I’m going to assume it was to change the colour of it, something a lot of people seem to do within the natural skincare world. Not me.
Would I buy this product? Yes, I would, but take into account if you’re vegan that this is NOT a vegan product since they use honey as part of their ingredient list!
Era Organics Face Wash
[amazon box=”B015G95C7A”]
[OVER 40s] Eavara’s Award Winning Organic Facial Cleanser
When it comes to cosmetics I tend to prefer those with less ingredients rather than too many. For my sensitive skin facial cream, for example, I only add grapeseed oil and sunflower oil, both really gentle on the skin (grapeseed goes in at heating point and sunflower oil at the point where the formulation is cooling down, I add around 3% of the total amount).
Voted “Best Anti-Ageing Skincare” in 2017 by American Choice Awards Eavara sounds already like a promising brand. The ingredients in this product are gentle enough to be suitable for sensitive skin, yet powerful enough to work on older skin that’s needing a little bit of extra love and care.
Created in Hawaii and made in the USA (wherever possible Eavara sources their ingredients from local organic growers in Hawaii), the nice combination of ingredients are brought to you by husband and wife team Samara and Tom Mitchell. I personally would have wanted to know the percentage of ingredients sourced from Hawaii as opposed to the rest as in my view this would have added value to the product, but never mind.
Still, I like the idea that this is not just another commercial product that makes it to your bathroom cabinet but rather a labour of love from people committed to deliver quality and effectiveness.
Let’s have a look at the ingredients:
Water, cocamidropropyl betaine (drived from coconut oil), emulsifying wax, organic citrus sinensis (orange) peel oil, manijot esculenta (tapioca) starch, cellulose gum, xantham gum, activated charcoal, decyl glucoside, organic aloe barbadensis gel, aspalathus linearis (rooibus) leaf extract, organic olea europaea (olive) oil, organic glycerin, organic helianthus annuus (sunflower) oil, dimethylaminoethanol (DMAE), camellia sinensis (green tea) leaf extract, organic cocos nucifera (coconut) oil, tocopherol, sodium hyaluronate, camellia sinensis (white tea) extract, panthenol (vitamin B5), calophylum tacamahaca (tamanu) seed oil, parfum, methyl sulfynol methane (MSM), phenoxyethanol, ascorbic acid (Vitamin C).
My only objection above would be the fragrance listed as: ‘parfum’ since this could mean literally anything. I would have very much preferred it if the brand had used another essential oil to aid the fragrance of the product (as they already use sweet orange essential oil).
In fact, we find the sweet orange essential oil in high percentages as it is sitting at ingredient n.4, so I wonder how much of this EO has gone into the product? Since this is a rinse-off product Orange EO can be used up to 6% of the total amount in terms of phototoxicity. By the way, now we know the rest of the ingredients that follow the sweet orange EO would have been added at ≤6% of the total amount.
I’m ok with the phenoxyethanol (preservative) component since I also use it in some of my formulations. I most definitely prefer a good preservative when there’s water in the product, particularly when the face wash has been shipped from far away and had probably been sitting on some shelf for a while before reaching into my hands. Phenoxyethanol might not the best preservative for liquid soaps as it is only partially soluble in water based products but Eavara has used an emulsifier in this particular face wash (the emulsification mixes the water parts with the oil parts) and I wish they’ve said which emulsifier they used.
In terms of the cleansing agents: cocamidropropyl betaine and decyl glucoside, I use them in my own formulations at home. They’re both very gentle on the skin, the first one can help improving flash foam while the second is a non-ionic surfactant which can be used as conditioner, emulsifier or foaming agent. Both are derived from coconuts. If you want to learn more about both (since all the products listed on this blog post use one or the other) you can go here and here.
I’m not that familiar with activated charcoal, to be honest, as I’m a little tired of seeing it everywhere as the latest fad and I’m aware of these types of fashion trends having worked in marketing for a few years. I used to love my Indian Monkey Brand Black Tooth Powder which consists of ayurvedic essential oils and charcoal and I must say it does taste as holistic as it sounds.
Let’s have a quick look at some of the ingredients here: methyl sulfynol methane enhances collagen bundles (source) good for skincare products aiming at anti-ageing. Tamanu oil (the ‘beauty leaf oil’) is expensive! It softens the wrinkles and also stimulates collagen production (see here). Olive oil and sunflower oil are gentle and great emollients. Olive oil nourishes and moisturises the skin, penetrating into the deeper layers. It protects from premature ageing with potent antioxidants and squalane. Sunflower oil is particularly good for sensitive skin, with high levels of linoleic acid giving it powerful skin-protective properties.
Out of the 26 ingredients, 6 are organic and I would have liked to see more organic ingredients within the product but I know that sometimes it is not easy, particularly if we want to keep the product within affordable prices. Also, organic doesn’t always mean better and many of the smaller growers can’t afford to go organic, so I take this with a pinch of salt at times.
Overall, the ingredient list is attractive and definitely aimed at someone looking for a gentle cleanser with some oomph.
Eavara’s Organic Facial Cleanser
[amazon box=”B01L149GH6″]
3 Lovely Natural Face Wash for Sensitive Skin
There you go! Three natural face washes which are truly lovely and will be suitable for your sensitive skin. It is important you get used to using face wash instead of regular soap or even the shower gel as a facial wash. The pH will be accurate and they’ll have ingredients that have been thought of for the facial skin which can truly do a wonderful job.
I am addicted to my own facial wash which I would never change for anything in the world. It has many of the ingredients listed above and I for sure will be incorporating some of the lovely additions by the companies above, i.e: the rosemary essential oil.
