Ingredients overview
Highlights
Key Ingredients
Other Ingredients
Skim through
Ingredient name | what-it-does | irr., com. | ID-Rating |
---|---|---|---|
Aqua | solvent | ||
Cyclopentasiloxane | emollient, solvent | ||
Caprylhydroxamic Acid | chelating | ||
Ci 14700 | colorant | ||
Coco-Caprylate | emollient | ||
Glycerin | skin-identical ingredient, moisturizer/humectant | 0, 0 | superstar |
Disodium EDTA | chelating | ||
Disodium Phosphate | buffering | ||
Panthenol | soothing, moisturizer/humectant | 0, 0 | goodie |
Helianthus Annuus Seed Oil | emollient | 0, 0 | goodie |
Isododecane | emollient, solvent | ||
Isopropyl Palmitate | emollient | 1, 3-4 | |
Benzyl Alcohol | preservative, perfuming, solvent, viscosity controlling | ||
Pantolactone | moisturizer/humectant | ||
Poloxamer 184 | surfactant/cleansing, emulsifying | ||
Propanediol | solvent, moisturizer/humectant | ||
Sodium Chloride | viscosity controlling | ||
Sodium Hydroxide | buffering | ||
Tocopherol (Pi01456) | antioxidant | 0-3, 0-3 | goodie |
Deliplus Desmaquillante BifasicoIngredients explained
Good old water, aka H2O. The most common skincare ingredient of all. You can usually find it right in the very first spot of the ingredient list, meaning it’s the biggest thing out of all the stuff that makes up the product.
It’s mainly a solvent for ingredients that do not like to dissolve in oils but rather in water.
Once inside the skin, it hydrates, but not from the outside - putting pure water on the skin (hello long baths!) is drying.
One more thing: the water used in cosmetics is purified and deionized (it means that almost all of the mineral ions inside it is removed). Like this, the products can stay more stable over time.
A super commonly used 5 unit long, cyclic structured silicone that is water-thin and does not stay on the skin but evaporates from it (called volatile silicone). Similar to other silicones, it gives skin and hair a silky, smooth feel.
It's often combined with the non-volatile (i.e. stays on the skin) dimethicone as the two together form a water-resistant, breathable protective barrier on the skin without a negative tacky feel.
A chelating agent that helps to preserve cosmetic products by neutralizing the metal ions (especially iron) in the formula (that usually get into there from water). Its special thing is that it also acts as a biostatic and fungistatic agent and remains active even at high pH.
It is often coupled with antimicrobial glycols (such as propanediol) to create a "preservative free preservative system" for cosmetic products.
A common colorant that gives products a nice red color.
A clear, colorless to slightly yellowish oil that makes the skin nice and smooth (emollient), spreads easily on the skin and is marketed as a good alternative to volatile (does not absorb into the skin but rather evaporates from it) silicones like Cyclomethicone.
- A natural moisturizer that’s also in our skin
- A super common, safe, effective and cheap molecule used for more than 50 years
- Not only a simple moisturizer but knows much more: keeps the skin lipids between our skin cells in a healthy (liquid crystal) state, protects against irritation, helps to restore barrier
- Effective from as low as 3% with even more benefits for dry skin at higher concentrations up to 20-40%
- High-glycerin moisturizers are awesome for treating severely dry skin
Super common little helper ingredient that helps products to remain nice and stable for a longer time. It does so by neutralizing the metal ions in the formula (that usually get into there from water) that would otherwise cause some not so nice changes.
It is typically used in tiny amounts, around 0.1% or less.
An easy-to-formulate, commonly used, nice to have ingredient that’s also called pro-vitamin B5. As you might guess from the “pro” part, it’s a precursor to vitamin B5 (whose fancy name is pantothenic acid).
Its main job in skincare products is to moisturise the skin. It’s a humectant meaning that it can help the skin to attract water and then hold onto it. There is also research showing that panthenol can help our skin to produce more lovely lipids that are important for a strong and healthy skin barrier.
Another great thing about panthenol is that it has anti-inflammatory and skin protecting abilities. A study shows that it can reduce the irritation caused by less-nice other ingredients (e.g. fragrance, preservatives or chemical sunscreens) in the product.
Research also shows that it might be useful for wound healing as it promotes fibroblast (nice type of cells in our skin that produce skin-firming collagen) proliferation.
If that wasn’t enough panthenol is also useful in nail and hair care products. A study shows that a nail treatment liquide with 2% panthenol could effectively get into the nail and significantly increase the hydration of it.
As for the hair the hydration effect is also true there. Panthenol might make your hair softer, more elastic and helps to comb your hair more easily.
Sunflower does not need a big intro as you probably use it in the kitchen as cooking oil, or you munch on the seeds as a healthy snack or you adore its big, beautiful yellow flower during the summer - or you do all of these and probably even more. And by even more we mean putting it all over your face as sunflower oil is one of the most commonly used plant oils in skincare.
It’s a real oldie: expressed directly from the seeds, the oil is used not for hundreds but thousands of years. According to The National Sunflower Association, there is evidence that both the plant and its oil were used by American Indians in the area of Arizona and New Mexico about 3000 BC. Do the math: it's more than 5000 years – definitely an oldie.
Our intro did get pretty big after all (sorry for that), so let's get to the point finally: sunflower oil - similar to other plant oils - is a great emollient that makes the skin smooth and nice and helps to keep it hydrated. It also protects the surface of the skin and enhances the damaged or irritated skin barrier. Leslie Bauman notes in Cosmetic Dermatology that one application of sunflower oil significantly speeds up the recovery of the skin barrier within an hour and sustains the results 5 hours after using it.
It's also loaded with fatty acids (mostly linoleic (50-74%) and oleic (14-35%)). The unrefined version (be sure to use that on your skin!) is especially high in linoleic acid that is great even for acne-prone skin. Its comedogen index is 0, meaning that it's pretty much an all skin-type oil.
Truth be told, there are many great plant oils and sunflower oil is definitely one of them.
A clear, colorless and odorless, highly volatile (meaning it does not absorb into the skin but evaporates from it) liquid that's used as an emollient. It gives a nice non-oily light skin feel and it can improve the slip of the formula without leaving a tacky residue behind.
It's also popular in make-up products as its volatility makes mascaras and foundations last longer. If that would not be enough, it's also an excellent solvent, and it's a regular not only on the ingredients lists of make-ups but also on makeup removers.
A clear, colorless emollient ester (oily liquid from isopropyl alcohol + palmitic acid) that makes the skin nice and smooth. It has very good spreading properties and gives a silky touch to the products.
It's one of those things that help your cosmetics not to go wrong too soon, aka a preservative. It can be naturally found in fruits and teas but can also be made synthetically.
No matter the origin, in small amounts (up to 1%) it’s a nice, gentle preservative. Has to be combined with some other nice preservatives, like potassium sorbate to be broad spectrum enough.
In high amounts, it can be a skin irritant, but don’t worry, it’s never used in high amounts.
A synthetic polymer (a big molecule made of repeated units) that's used as a mild cleansing agent. It is also used in contact lens solutions and a regular on the ingredient lists of micellar cleansing waters.
Chemically speaking, it is an interesting molecule with an oil-loving part in the middle surrounded by two water-loving parts. The numbers in the molecule refer to the overall molecular size and the water-loving part in it (40%). Poloxamer 184 is almost half-half oil and water-soluble, likes to form micelles (molecules gathered into a ball form with oil-loving parts inside and water-loving parts outside) and is claimed to be an effective cleansing agent that is also mild on the skin and the eyes.
If you wanna know more about poloxamers, we have some more info at Poloxamer 407 >>
Propanediol is a natural alternative for the often used and often bad-mouthed propylene glycol. It's produced sustainably from corn sugar and it's Ecocert approved.
It's quite a multi-tasker: can be used to improve skin moisturization, as a solvent, to boost preservative efficacy or to influence the sensory properties of the end formula.
Sodium chloride is the fancy name of salt. Normal, everyday table salt.
If (similar to us) you are in the weird habit of reading the label on your shower gel while taking a shower, you might have noticed that sodium chloride is almost always on the ingredient list. The reason for this is that salt acts as a fantastic thickener in cleansing formulas created with ionic cleansing agents (aka surfactants) such as Sodium Laureth Sulfate. A couple of percents (typically 1-3%) turns a runny surfactant solution into a nice gel texture.
If you are into chemistry (if not, we understand, just skip this paragraph), the reason is that electrolytes (you know, the Na+ and Cl- ions) screen the electrostatic repulsion between the head groups of ionic surfactants and thus support the formation of long shaped micelles (instead of spherical ones) that entangle like spaghetti, and viola, a gel is formed. However, too much of it causes the phenomenon called "salting out", and the surfactant solution goes runny again.
Other than that, salt also works as an emulsion stabilizer in water-in-oil emulsions, that is when water droplets are dispersed in the outer oil (or silicone) phase. And last but not least, when salt is right at the first spot of the ingredient list (and is not dissolved), the product is usually a body scrub where salt is the physical exfoliating agent.
The unfancy name for it is lye. It’s a solid white stuff that’s very alkaline and used in small amounts to adjust the pH of the product and make it just right.
For example, in case of AHA or BHA exfoliants, the right pH is super-duper important, and pH adjusters like sodium hydroxide are needed.
BTW, lye is not something new. It was already used by ancient Egyptians to help oil and fat magically turn into something else. Can you guess what? Yes, it’s soap. It still often shows up in the ingredient list of soaps and other cleansers.
Sodium hydroxide in itself is a potent skin irritant, but once it's reacted (as it is usually in skin care products, like exfoliants) it is totally harmless.
- Primary fat-soluble antioxidant in our skin
- Significant photoprotection against UVB rays
- Vit C + Vit E work in synergy and provide great photoprotection
- Has emollient properties
- Easy to formulate, stable and relatively inexpensive
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what‑it‑does | solvent |
what‑it‑does | emollient | solvent |
what‑it‑does | chelating |
what‑it‑does | colorant |
what‑it‑does | emollient |
what‑it‑does | skin-identical ingredient | moisturizer/humectant |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
what‑it‑does | chelating |
what‑it‑does | buffering |
what‑it‑does | soothing | moisturizer/humectant |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
what‑it‑does | emollient |
irritancy, com. | 0, 0 |
what‑it‑does | emollient | solvent |
what‑it‑does | emollient |
irritancy, com. | 1, 3-4 |
what‑it‑does | preservative | perfuming | solvent | viscosity controlling |
what‑it‑does | moisturizer/humectant |
what‑it‑does | surfactant/cleansing | emulsifying |
what‑it‑does | solvent | moisturizer/humectant |
what‑it‑does | viscosity controlling |
what‑it‑does | buffering |
what‑it‑does | antioxidant |
irritancy, com. | 0-3, 0-3 |