Do you already know these marvelous, natural, herbal distillates that are believed to have been outperforming face toners recently. Blogosphere adores them that’s why you can come across many positive comments describing their outstanding benefits. Well, I’m a fan of herbal distillates myself and I own a few of them.
Rose distillate, lavender distillate and neroli – this is a powerful trio that I can rely on when it comes to boosting my looks. Actually, I don’t only apply them to face skin but also to body and hair. Moreover, I use them to create my own homemade beauty products which effects are totally out of this world. However, sometimes, mostly at the beginning of my herbal distillate adventure, I happened to buy a product that turned out to be either a counterfeit or wasn’t 100% pure. For that reason, today I’m going to share my experience with you and tell you which herbal distillate is worth getting. Also, I’ll try to explain you why having a herbal distillate at home is a really great idea. Enjoy! 🙂
Herbal distillate: Hydrosol or floral water?
Firstly, I’ve noticed that frequently herbal distillate (also known as hydrosol) is called floral water. Well… this is incorrect because we shouldn’t confuse natural herbal distillate (hydrosol) with floral water.
Floral water (or fragranced floral water) is nothing more but an alcohol solution that, obviously, is enriched with odor substances including highly concentrated essential oils. It’s used to make your body smell good, not to condition it. In short, its characteristic feature is an intensive aroma of a particular flower that it was made of. You can expect the fragrance to remain long on your skin.
Herbal distillates, on the other hand, are mostly colorless liquids. I’d describe their aroma as subtle and delicate which obviously radically differs from the aroma of essential oil that it was obtained from. The best example that I can give you right now is the difference between orange essential oil aroma and distillate extracted from bitter orange blossoms. I remember my great disappointment when I came back home with a neroli distillate, I unscrewed the bottle and… this strange, slightly weird aroma wrinkled my nose. Surely, you may sense a subtle aroma ‘tint’ in some herbal distillates. Still, they will never smell as intensively as floral water. Basically, it must be realized that herbal distillates’ task is to condition your body, not to make it smell good.
How to buy genuine herbal distillate?
Trust me, you shouldn’t have any problems with telling flower water from herbal distillate. Firstly, their labels are well-described and secondly, flower water smells ‘perfumish’. It gets a little bit more demanding when you want to buy pure herbal distillate.
Sadly, you can come across many products which name is the only thing that connects them with herbal distillates. So what are the tips for buying a decent herbal distillate or, as some tend to call it, hydrosol? First and foremost, check the list of ingredients. It should be short. To clarify, if you notice any of the following ingredients in INCI section: propylene glycol, ethanol, citronellol, geraniol phenoxyethanol or glycerin – just put the product back onto the self.
However, if you notice a label reading: 100% Helichrysum Italicum Hydrosol or Rosa Damascena Hydrosol – put either in your basket because this is the genuine herbal distillate you were looking for. Just one more thing to add, when it comes to rose distillate, the composition can be made from water and rose oil – and such formula is also okay.
Why it’s beneficial to introduce herbal distillates into daily body and hair care?
A high quality herbal distillate offers you incredibly positive beautifying properties. Generally, such product moisturizes, freshens up and nourishes skin. Also, it tonifies, soothes and makes a good carrier for natural oils. Moreover, a high quality herbal distillate reduces redness, relieves inflammations and accelerates skin healing up.
Additionally, you can use herbal distillate in hair care in order to reinforce hair bulbs and take care of scalp: herbal distillate soothes and balances sebum production. As far as I’m concerned there are herbal distillates that protect hair against external aggressors and some of them are even able to fight back hair thinning.
Another thing to mention, herbal distillate has pH close to that of human skin therefore it can be applied directly to skin without thinning it with water first. In short, herbal distillates are gentle and handle skin tonifying. Moreover, genuine herbal distillate neither contains alcohol nor synthetics, thus it’s super gentle and safe for skin, including sensitive and allergy-prone skin.
Finally, herbal distillates offer – which makes me adore them so much – universal application. They can be used in face, body and hair care. I often combine them with medicinal clays, beauty oils, aloe gel and hyaluronic acid. I add them to vinegar hair wash, homemade hair/face masks and scrubs. I also cool my body down with them during the summer.
What are your thoughts about herbal distillates? Fancy giving them a go? Perhaps you know some recipes or favorite hydrosols to share? Share you thought below and take care!
