In 2018, in the United States alone, the cosmetics industry produced 7.9 billion units of plastic waste, as reported here and elsewhere. Globally, only about 9% of plastic is recycled. The rest ends up in landfills, oceans, the air, and in the tissues of living beings, including humans. I find this alarming and so have been working to dump plastic from my life.
Previous posts in this series dealt with dental care and hair care, so this post will focus on skincare. Now, in the haircare post I advocated using soap and a washcloth for body care. If you use lotion, consider trying this product from Ethique that comes as a bar in compostable packaging. You add boiling water to melt it, and stir it to create the lotion. My skin seems to think it's yummy, so I can recommend it.
Ethique also has a nice face soap which I have been using recently. It's pretty easy to find good moisturizing bars with minimal to no plastic packaging. You can find them at Farmer's Markets, health food stores, and online. I'll leave you to it.
Face moisturizers? Well, I've had to change those up over the years. I used to use products from Burt's Bees which is pretty local to me in New England. They had some nice moisturizers packaged in glass containers, albeit with plastic lids. In recent years, though, their day moisturizers have been packaged plastic.
So I switched to the one pictured on the right, from Indian Meadow Herbals packaged in a glass jar with a metal lid. It's good but I like trying new things, so am using the purple product from Ethique, a solid in a push-up compostable tube. I'm not sure how much is getting onto my skin or how well it's moisturizing it. Plus, as I have mentioned before, their products are shipped all the way from New Zealand. I try to take into consideration but must admit that I scarf down large amounts of chocolate and tea shipped from far away. I am not consistent on this front, to be sure.
For now, I have mostly settled on products from Badger, based near me in New Hampshire. I order directly from their site and use several of their products. I like their night cream. Getting back to body care, I use their mineral sunscreens packaged in recyclable mental containers. These are all good and recommended. I did find a plastic-free mineral sunscreen for your face in Canada this summer, made by Attitude Living. I found it in a chain drugstore, but haven't seen anything similar around here yet.
That pretty much wraps up this post. I don't really use make-up because 1) I've never been a girly girl and 2) I hate fussing with such things. Most importantly, looks have always seemed the least important thing about me, or anyone else. As a teenager, I observed that anyone who bases their self esteem on their looks is not likely to age well -especially those of us who identify as female where youth (and whiteness) are upheld as the standard. Ridiculous.
So basing one's self concept on more enduring qualities seems like a good strategic move. For those reasons, I have not really explored plastic-free make-up products. I have seen some in stores but there doesn't seem to be a wide selection. I use what I have as little as possible, given that I do have to lead public worship and it's considered "professional dress."
Previous posts in this series dealt with dental care and hair care, so this post will focus on skincare. Now, in the haircare post I advocated using soap and a washcloth for body care. If you use lotion, consider trying this product from Ethique that comes as a bar in compostable packaging. You add boiling water to melt it, and stir it to create the lotion. My skin seems to think it's yummy, so I can recommend it.
Ethique also has a nice face soap which I have been using recently. It's pretty easy to find good moisturizing bars with minimal to no plastic packaging. You can find them at Farmer's Markets, health food stores, and online. I'll leave you to it.
Face moisturizers? Well, I've had to change those up over the years. I used to use products from Burt's Bees which is pretty local to me in New England. They had some nice moisturizers packaged in glass containers, albeit with plastic lids. In recent years, though, their day moisturizers have been packaged plastic.
So I switched to the one pictured on the right, from Indian Meadow Herbals packaged in a glass jar with a metal lid. It's good but I like trying new things, so am using the purple product from Ethique, a solid in a push-up compostable tube. I'm not sure how much is getting onto my skin or how well it's moisturizing it. Plus, as I have mentioned before, their products are shipped all the way from New Zealand. I try to take into consideration but must admit that I scarf down large amounts of chocolate and tea shipped from far away. I am not consistent on this front, to be sure.
For now, I have mostly settled on products from Badger, based near me in New Hampshire. I order directly from their site and use several of their products. I like their night cream. Getting back to body care, I use their mineral sunscreens packaged in recyclable mental containers. These are all good and recommended. I did find a plastic-free mineral sunscreen for your face in Canada this summer, made by Attitude Living. I found it in a chain drugstore, but haven't seen anything similar around here yet.
That pretty much wraps up this post. I don't really use make-up because 1) I've never been a girly girl and 2) I hate fussing with such things. Most importantly, looks have always seemed the least important thing about me, or anyone else. As a teenager, I observed that anyone who bases their self esteem on their looks is not likely to age well -especially those of us who identify as female where youth (and whiteness) are upheld as the standard. Ridiculous.
So basing one's self concept on more enduring qualities seems like a good strategic move. For those reasons, I have not really explored plastic-free make-up products. I have seen some in stores but there doesn't seem to be a wide selection. I use what I have as little as possible, given that I do have to lead public worship and it's considered "professional dress."