While I love autumn for fashion – the textures, the layers, the colour palette – I really dislike what the potent combination of chilly weather and central heating does to my skin and hair. Is it just me or does everything feel rough and dehydrated right now?! Forget being jolly, tis the season to slather yourself in moisturising lotions and potions! Thankfully, I have a gorgeous, light-as-air body butter which I made myself (!) with the help of the incredible Liha from LIHA Beauty. Want to learn how to make a body butter of your very own? I’m sharing everything you need to know in this post.
I’ve been learning about various oils and natural beauty remedies through my interest in Ayurveda, so when an invite to a beauty workshop with Liha Beauty landed in my inbox, I jumped at the chance to learn from an expert. Liha and her business partner Abi had a desire to create a natural, organic and vegan skincare brand which blended West African beauty traditions with English aromatherapy and folk remedies. And thus, LIHA Beauty was born.
Liha is super passionate about using high-quality ingredients – she would ask Abi to bring back Nigerian shea butter from her father’s hometown. We chatted a lot about the importance of natural skincare and understanding how ingredients are processed.
A lot of mass-market beauty products which include shea butter as an ingredient are often highly processed, removing the natural colour and scent as well as the essential fatty acids and proteins which make it a super hydrating beauty ingredient. By contrast, raw shea butter varies in colour, has a softly roasted fragrance and absorbs easily. It’s extracted and processed using traditional African techniques. Raw shea butter is an anti-ageing dream, packed with Vitamins A and E, tons of antioxidants and six essential fatty acids.
Naturally, the body butter I made has a shea butter base. As well as being an anti-ageing super ingredient, it’s moisturising, helps to reduce inflammation and blemishes, restores elasticity and helps to soothe and tone your skin. We also included cold-pressed coconut oil, which is also great for moisturising skin and reducing inflammation. It’s made up of medium-chain fatty acids which can help protect skin from harmful bacteria. These properties are really important to me as I sometimes suffer from eczema so I always look for gentle, moisturising, anti-inflammatory ingredients.
So how do you make your own body butter? There are five quick and easy steps:
- Add a spoonful of raw shea butter
Use the back of your spoon to smooth out any lumps in the shea butter. - Add a spoonful of cold-pressed coconut butter
Mix the shea butter and coconut oil well with your spoon - Whip it
Use a whisk to whip your mixture together. You can either lightly whip it to create a thicker body butter or whip it well to create a lighter, airy body butter. - Mix in your essential oils
This step is optional but I really love the idea of personalising your body butter with a scent. Liha recommended using one base note oil, one middle note oil and one top note oil. I opted for patchouli (earthy, woody, grounding and calming), rose (intensely floral, soothing, healing, sweet and rich) and lavender (woody, floral, relaxing and anti-inflammatory). - Forget about it
That’s it! All you need to do now is store your body butter somewhere cool and dark for two weeks for it to infuse.I can’t believe it’s that simple to make a natural body butter! I had such a fantastic time learning about the benefits of natural skincare and which ingredients to look out for. Now that you know how to make natural body butter, will you give it a try?
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