The home of SwiftCraftyMonkey Formulating Inc.! Join Susan as she obsesses about cosmetic chemistry and other things (some possibly related to monkeys). Often strange, occasionally useful, and always worth a stop as a point of interest on your journey through the Intertron.
If you’ve ever wondered what it would feel like to change just one ingredient in that lotion, then wonder no more! Marina spent ages changing just one ingredient at a time to see what each thing brought to her product, and she’s reporting her results to us! Please visit this post – then scroll down to...
From this post, Conditioner!, Karen asks: When formulating your (conditioner) recipes, do you go by weight or volume? And Crystal asked in the Lotions: Adding the additives post, I am NEW to lotion making-mostly I do oil, water and emulsifying wax. And I have grown used to using teaspoons, and ounces. I don’t understand how to...
Don’t be scared of lotion making! Yes, failure is a possibility, but if you start with a good recipe, use enough of an appropriate emulsifier, and follow good manufacturing processes, it’s almost a guarantee you’ll create an awesome lotion that won’t separate. Remember that a good lotion requires three things to emulsify – heat, mixing,...
As I mentioned at the start of this series, the lotions we make are oil-in-water recipes, meaning that the oil is floating in globules inside the water phase. We can also make water-in-oil recipes, meaning that the water is floating in globules inside the oil phase. For these kinds of lotions, we require different emulsifiers....
Optiphen – INCI: Phenoxyethanol (and) Caprylyl Glycol – is, unfortunately, a bit of a pain in the bum when it comes to lotion making. Yep, it’s another reason your lotion could fail. As a note, I’m hearing that Optiphen Plus (INCI: Phenoxyethanol (and) Caprylyl Glycol (and) Sorbic Acid) and Optiphen ND (INCI: Phenoxyethanol, Benzoic Acid, Dehydroacetic Acid) are curdling...