23 Sep 2022Read of the weekRead of the week: beauty innovation goes eco-heavy
image-75069972a0157bb5e83d7cb6cb46957606fbb901-3805x5708-jpg

Brands, businesses, organisations and consumers are all looking for new ways to minimise their environmental impact. In the world of beauty, trend-led products have a habit of exploiting natural resources, but is tapping into the benefits of soil a key to greater climate consciousness?

Author
J’Nae PhillipsJ'Nae Phillips is a Senior Insights Editor at Canvas8. After an early career working in fashion and media, her passion for culture and journalism grew and she made the transition to writing and editing full-time. She specialises in fashion, trends, cultural shifts and all of the good stuff that gets people talking.

Science-backed skincare and credible cosmetics are leading people to become more clued up about what they put on their skin, with surface-level solutions no longer enough to satisfy savvy beauty lovers that are more aware of how their consumption habits impact the environment - a study by beauty and wellness retailer Holland & Barrett in the UK found that 97% of women want beauty brands to be more transparent about ingredients, while two-thirds of female shoppers worldwide want greater label transparency.

Natural ingredients such as aloe, almond, rose and rice are used so often in beauty, skin and hair care products that it's easy to forget these ingredients are mined from natural resources. And the prominence of palm oil in beauty which is used in products like soap, shampoo and makeup, is leading to deforestation, pollution and a loss of biodiversity in Southeastern Asia, Africa, and Latin America where palm oil is mostly grown - over 25% of Indonesia's rainforests have been deforested and replaced with palm oil plantations.

But how can soil help? As beauty innovation goes eco-heavy with people's lifestyle choices coming under intense scrutiny, regenerative agriculture that rejuvenates soil used to grow raw beauty ingredients can help brands explore a better way of doing things. Davines, an Italian family-owned brand, launched We Stand / for Regeneration, a hair and body wash and physical manifesto committed to making eco-positive beauty changes long-term.