Ingredients

Ingredient Dictionary

If you there is an ingredient in our products that you don't recognise, then you are in the right place! This dictionary has been created for you to promote accessible education around hair and skin care products. We have chosen our ingredients carefully for ethics and efficiency, and we are proud of them. We want you to know exactly what you are using. After all, knowledge is power!

First up, you will find the most unfamiliar of ingredients, but we have also given the raw and liquid ingredients that you know and love, an honourable mention towards the end, along with our favourite oils and fragrances too.

Feel Good, Feel Better

These ingredients include emulsifiers, fatty alcohols and thickeners that help a good product to feel even better by enhancing their formula or the benefits of the raw ingredients used alongside them.

Almond Wax

An effective thickener that helps to give our Lips Too Balm the smooth consistency, and longevity you know and love.

Behentrimonium Methosulfate

An emulsifier and conditioning agent that transforms a lotion into a conditioner. It helps to impart softness, smoothness and long-lasting hydration.

Behenyl/ Cetearyl /Cetyl Alcohols

These are fatty acids, not drying alcohols. They make a good
product better by enhancing their thickness and giving extra slip – exactly what you want for your conditioners.

Please note that our supplier does not distinguish if these alcohols are derived from either coconut oil or palm oil, or both. 

Carbomer 94

A gelling agent that helps our Curl Crush Flaxseed & Marshmallow Gel to smooth define your curls.

Ceteareth-2

It is both an emulsifier and a thickener that helps to give our Coconut Cream Deep Conditioning Hair Mask its fluffy consistency.

Dimethicone

You won’t find this silicone in our Curly Girl Method-friendly hair products – but in both our skincare and body products, it behaves very differently.

A touch of dimethicone helps to reduce the "soaping effect" of our lotions to make them easier to rub into the skin. We never use more than 2% of this ingredient in any product, frequently less, as that's all it takes.

Dimethicone does not 'build-up' on the skin and can be cleansed with our vegan soaps or our Hydra Boost Sulphate-Free Body Wash.

Glyceryl Oleate

It foams, it emulsifies, and it helps to offset the drying effect of lathering up both hair and skincare products by conditioning as you cleanse.

Glyceryl Stearate & PEG-10

This duo works together to keep the both the liquids and the oils in our products working in unison as an emulsion. It “pearlises” and draws moisture to it for extra hydration too.

Our supplier is a cruelty-free supplier, so our glyceryl stearate comes from plant sources.

Glucono Delta Lactone 

It is a chelating agent that helps to draw toxins from your hair, as well as providing moisturising benefits.

Lauric Acid 

It is anti-bacterial, anti-inflammatory and helps to make our soaps more soothing and reparative as they cleanse.

Polysorbate 80

A biodegradable food additive that helps to combine our oils and natural fragrances with our water-based ingredients – without compromising on their consistency.

Stearic Acid

An emulsifier that helps to harden our soaps and add both conditioning and protective properties to our conditioners.

Sunflower Wax

This emulsifier helps to bind our Lips Too Balm without a sticky feel.

Xanthan Gum

A common food-grade thickener that is popular with vegans and helps to give a more gel-like texture to products.

Good Clean Feeling

These ingredients consist of surfactants that help to upgrade your cleansing experience with our hair, skincare and body products.

Caprylyl/Capryl Glucoside

These are derived from fatty acids and help to create a bubbly lather in our Moisture Silk Sulphate-Free Shampoo and Hydra Boost Sulphate-Free Body Wash.

Cocamidopropyl Betaine/ Coco/ Decyl Glucoside

These are mild surfactants found in our shampoo and body wash that help to boost both their foaming and cleansing abilities.

Glyceryl Oleate & Coco Glucoside

This duo works together to improve the viscosity and lather in our shampoo.

Olivoil Surfactant
This surfactant helps to promote softer skin after using our body wash.

Sodium Cocoyl Isethinoate
Another mild surfactant with dense, creamy, luxurious bubbles that impart a soft, silky feeling to your hair and skin. It is gentle enough for babies and still effective for you. It is a sodium salt ester, or fatty acid derived from coconut oil.

Moisture, Moisturising, Moisturised

These ingredients include butters, esters, fats, humectants and moisturisers that help to draw moisture to your hair and skin, as well as locking it in.

Alkyl Benzoate

An emollient that easily absorbs into your skin, leaving it feeling supple and silky. This is an ester, which is an alternative to oil.
Frequently, products labelled "oil-free" contain esters like these. This ingredient combats clumping, tackiness, and works to make other oils feel less greasy.

For example, when combined with shea butter, you get its properties but with a less greasy feeling and a product that is easier to spread. It makes a great alternative if your hair, scalp or skin is sensitive to plant or nut oils. It is vegetable derived and safe enough for use in baby products.

Allantoin

A protectant and softener. This ingredient naturally occurs in comfrey root and the aloe vera plant. It is extracted and then dried into a powder.

In our hair products it helps to protect your hair. In our skincare products, it prevents chapped, cracked, ruptured, or windburned skin, and acts to increase the water content of your skin, thus keeping it in balance.  

Capric/Caprylic Glycerides
A skin and hair conditioning agent that increases moisture and smoothness. Coconut-derived.

Plant-Based Preservatives

These ingredients help to maintain the efficacy and safety of all of our products by preventing the growth of mould and bacteria for longer.

Dehydroacetic Acid & Benzyl Alcohol

This is a certified  eco-safe, organic preservative that is best used in products that contain other organic ingredients, such as our hair products and our Bentonite & Goat’s Milk Face Mask

Pheynoxyethanol & Ethylhexylglycerin

A broad, balanced preservative that protects products against bacteria, yeasts and mould. It is derived from coconuts and is free of harmful parabens, and urea.

Sodium Benzoate

A common food-grade preservative. It is derived from benzoic acid, which is a type of salt, and provides good anti-microbial and fungicidal protection. It works best in products whose pH is more on the acidic end.

Popular, Powerful and Purposeful

These ingredients help to elevate our hair, skincare and body products by contributing anti-static, conditioning, detangling and strengthening properties.


Cetrimonium Chloride

A hair conditioning agent that helps to reduce static electricity and helps to improve both wet and dry combing of the hair. It also offers extra protection in preserving our products.

Citric Acid

An edible, water-free salt that is used to counter oxidation of metal ions that are typically found in water. It also serves as a pH adjuster to keep our products within the optimal range for your hair and skin.

This also serves as an essential component of bath bombs and some types of confectionary. If you have ever eaten sour candy,
you have eaten citric acid! 

Coco Caprylate/ Caprate

It is a fast-spreading emollient that helps to give our hair products more glide and make them smooth and silky to the touch.

It does not block moisture from the hair and can be rinsed out with a shampoo as gentle as our Moisture Silk Sulphate-Free shampoo.

Hydrolysed Oat/ Silk/ Pea Proteins

Hydrolysing a product means making its particles small enough for your hair and skin to properly absorb. Your hair is made from a protein called keratin and the hydrolysed proteins in our hair products help to patch up weak spots on your hair shaft to strengthen it. 

If you find that your hair dries out quickly, you may need more protein than someone whose hair maintains its moisture levels for longer between wash days. In our skincare products, these proteins act to help prevent trans-epidermal water loss (TEWL).

So, once you have moisturised your skin, the protein helps to lock that moisture in, ensuring that your skin stays supple for longer. 

Panthenol

An active ingredient that helps to improve hydration in our hair products, making your hair shiny and smooth. As well as reducing itching and inflammation in our skincare products.

Polyquaternium 7, 11 and 4

These are cationic polymers that are positively charged and bind to your negatively charged hair and skin to boost the conditioning effects of our hair and skincare products. They are comprised of both natural and synthetic compounds.

The number attached at the end of their name conveys different properties – Polyquaternium 7 is a conditioning agent and humectant. Whereas Polyquaternium 11 is an excellent thickener, providing hold in our styling products. It rinses from your hair easily with water and mild cleanser.

Fragrances and Essential Oils

These ingredients help to create an experience around your hair and skincare routines with soothing, refreshing, and inviting scents – with the additional therapeutic benefits of essential oils.


Essential oil of Lavender
Essential oil of Lemongrass
Essential oil of Sweet Orange
“Fragrance”


The fragrances in our products are all are proprietary, are all vegan and phthalate-free.

Hydrate, Hydrate, Hydrate!

These ingredients consist of liquids and they help to hydrate and nourish, and make the base of many of our hair, skincare and body products.


Almond Milk
Aloe Vera Leaf Juice
Coconut Milk
De-Ionised Water
Rose Water

Raw Ingredients

These ingredients include natural extracts, powders and proteins. They are natural and predominantly unprocessed, with only a few being minimally processed.

Some help to give our products a nicer appearance, and many enhance the texture, efficacy and nourishing benefits of our products.


Beetroot Powder
Bentonite Clay
Cinnamon Powder
Cocoa Powder (Fair Trade)
Crystallised Ginger (Dehydrated)
Fine Oat Silk (Oat Ground to the Finest Powder)
Flaxseed Extract
French Green Clay
Goat’s Milk Powder/ Extract
Green Tea Extract
Hibiscus Plant/Extract/Flower
Liquid Silk
Marshmallow Root Extract
Nutmeg Powder
Paprika Powder
Raspberry Powder
Raw Oats (Aveena Oat Flakes)
Slippery Elm Extract
Sodium Hydroxide
(its high pH serves as a neutralising agent for very acidic ingredients, or actives to make soap. It is not
present in the actual finished product)
Spirulina
Sugar (Turbanado)
Vanilla Bean Seeds
Vitamin E
Willowbark Extract

Oils

Avocado Oil
Babassu Oil
Castor Oil
Cocoa Butter
Hazelnut Oil
Hempseed Oil
Mango Butter
Maracuja (Passionfruit) Oil
Olive Oil (Extra Virgin)
Palm Oil (Red and White) RSPO-certified
Rice Bran Oil
Shea Butter (Organic Ghanaian)
Sunflower Oil
Sweet Almond Oil
Vegetable Glycerine (Non-Palm)
Virgin Coconut Oil

Salts

These ingredients are found in our vegan soaps. As soaps are created by a reaction of lipids with an alkali, they are technically salts!

So, you will find familiar oils and butters listed as their respective salts. You can cross check these with the Oils to see what lipids have been used.

Sodium Cocoate
Sodium Grapseedate
Sodium Lactate
Sodium Laurate
Sodium Olivate
Sodium Palmate
Sodium Ricinoleate
Sodium Shea Butterate (Organic)
Sodium Sunflowerate