Macadamia Facial lotion-Tutorial

As the latest tutorial of the year, I've a wonderful easy but effective facial care lotion for you.

My creams and lotions are most often very complicated because I mainly formulate for the industry and everything for the industry should be rather complicated to be acceptable. My dear aromatherapist, soap and natural cosmetics manufacturer colleague Wendy Gardner who is a convinced anti-palm activist as well, inspired me to prepare this formulation during a chat. I made it and I fell in love with it immediately. This would be the beginning of many coming "simple and easy" emulsions based on floral waters (hydrosols) and one to two plant oils for lotion crafters in the next year.

Inspired by Wendy, I chose Macadamia nut oil, called a "vanishing oil" because of its excellent, non-greasy skin feel and rapid absorption and spreadability. The oil contains about 9% palmitic acid and about 20% palmitoleic acid (like whale oil) which makes it an excellent spreading oil with a pleasant feel. With 20% macadamia nut oil, this would be a rich but still light in feel cream excellent for winter skin care when the skin is exposed to wind, dry air and extreme temperature difference between indoor and outdoor.

I replaced the whole water with Geranium hydrosol and applied Geranium essential oil, both being excellent skin care ingredients with anti-inflammatory and skin rejuvenating effects.

The emulsifier is an Olive oil based, PEG-free and ecocert certified emulsifier: Olivem 1000 with a neutral inherent color and scent which do not affect the lotion at all. Since the emulsifier imparts a light thickening to the emulsion, you generally don't need any viscosity modifier for this formulation which makes the whole process easier but it is advisable to add low concentrations of a natural gum such as sclerotium, xanthan or acacia gum for an improved long-term stability.

The outcome generally depends on how you mix and homogenize the emulsion. Most of you apply probably a mini mixer which is suitable for small quantities. I have even prepared this formulation by stirring with a magnetic stirrer or a glass rod (for quantities about 10-50 ml). The more effective you homogenize, the smaller the dispersed particles and the more stable the emulsion. But even by stirring with hand (spatula or glass rod) or a magnetic stirrer, this emulsion would be stable over 4-8 weeks which is quite reasonable for a home-made lotion.

Even though the hydrosols are preserved, I've applied a preservative. I do not like the risk of preparing a non-preserved lotion and do not recommend this to anyone. Even if you know that you'll use the lotion in a few days up to one week, the risk of contamination is higher than the (possible) side effects of any preservative. In this case, I've applied the Euxyl® PE9010 which is allowed and tolerated in natural cosmetics.  

In my case, the lotion had a viscosity of about 15000 mPaS (@10rpm, S34, Brookfield) which is suitable to be filled in a lotion bottle, in an airless dispenser or in a cream jar, I decided to fill it in a lotion bottle with lotion pump, wait for your finished lotion before you decide between bottle or cream jar, depending on your stirring method and all other parameters, your viscosity might be lower or higher than my sample.

Before we start I want to recommend you to read our older posts: hygienic manufacturing practice in cosmetic lab and introduction to Basic equipments and utensils for a cosmetic lab.
 

For this project (50 gr Emulsion) you'll need:

Water phase:

64,6% Geranium hydrosol (32,3 gr)

6,0% Glycerin or organic Glycerin (3,0 gr)

0,5% Panthenol (0,25 gr: 4-5 drops)

Oil Phase:

20,0% Macadamia nut oil (10,0 gr)

0,5% alpha-Tocopherol (0,25 gr: 4-5 drops) 

1,0% lipophilic hops extracr (0,5 gr)

1,0% lipophilic aloe extract (0,5 gr)

5,0% Olivem 1000 (2,5 gr)

 ------------------

0,9% Preservative (0,45 gr: 8-9 drops)

0,5% Geranium essential oil (0,25 gr: 5-6 drops)

You'll need as well: 

a water bath to heat the water and oil phases 

one 100 ml beaker and one at least 50 ml beaker or other suitable jars

(optional) a glass rod, spatula or any other suitable spoon or spatula to mix the ingredients

disposable pipettes

a hand mixer, a magnetic stirrer or any other suitable instrument to homogenize the emulsion

Suitable lotion bottles, airless dispensers or cream jars

Here we go:

One: in the 100 ml beaker weight your water phase consisting of Geranium hydrosol, glycerin and panthenol 

Two: in another beaker (this should be at least 50 ml), weight the oil phase consisting of the macadamia nut oil, the lipophilic extracts of hops and aloe vera, vitamin E (alpha-Tocopherol) and the emulsifier.

Three: Heat up both phases in a water bath @ 75-80 degrees Celsius. You'll need about 5-10 minutes for this quantity. Stir both phases now and then with separate glass rods for an even heat distribution. Continue heating until all of the emulsifier is melted and you can mix the oil phase to a homogeneous liquid.

Four: from here on, the procedure depends on your instruments and supplies. Certain is: you should add the oil phase very sloooooowly to the water phase under rapid mixing and agitation. If you're mixing per hand, 4 hands are much better than 2 in this step. Call your lotion buddy for help. I usually add oil phase to the water phase as the water phase is still in the water bath and apply the magnetic stirrer. Here I took the beaker out of the water bath so that you can distinguish the procedure in the photo. While you're stirring the water phase (with a glass rod, magnetic stirrer or any other suitable instrument available to you) add the oil phase slowly to the water phase.

Immediately after adding oil to water, you'll observe the change in appearance. The clear water phase changes to a milky emulsion. Here I have the beaker over the magnetic stirrer. The emulsion is milky, but the particles are still big. This is why the emulsion has a yellowish appearance. (the oil and the extracts are yellow-apricot in color).

This is another view of the emulsion over magnetic stirrer. 

Here I apply my marcus (homogenizer) for 1 minute @about 8000 rpm. Do you recognize the change in the color? The turbo mixer crashed the big oil particles and reduces the particle size so that the yellowish emulsion changes to a white one.

Five: If you're applying a magnetic stirrer continue stirring while the emulsion cools down.

If you've applied a mini mixer or something like that, apply the mixer for a few minutes and then mix further any now and then as the emulsion is cooling down.

If you mix per hand and a glass rod, let the emulsion cool down and stir it every 5-10 minutes until it's cool.

Do not cool the emulsion in a fridge, let it sloooowly cool down. It may take depending on the ambient  temperature from half an hour to one hour.

Six: As the emulsion reaches a temperature of about 30 degrees Celsius, add the preservative and Geranium essential oil and stir (per hand, a mixer or a magnetic stirrer) for a few minutes.

Voila, the emulsion is ready.

Seven: wait for the emulsion to completely cool down before you fill it in the bottle or jar.

The emulsion reaches its final viscosity after about 24 hrs.

Here I have filled the small sample adapter of the Brookfield viscometer to measure the viscosity after 48 hrs.

This is the spindle spinning in the lotion for viscosity measurement. 

I hope you enjoy this recipe. Let me have your comments after preparing this recipe and send me your photos if you want.

You can buy all the ingredients for this project in SkinChakra® Online Shop.


 

BeHappy and have fun.