Sunday 1 May 2011

Duplicating products: Philosophy's Purity Made Simple cleanser

Aesthete recommended this product, Philosophy's "cult" cleanser Purity Made Simple as a possible duplication. (If you want to make your own suggestion, visit this post and make a comment. Please make sure you give me a link and an ingredient list as I don't have time to track down all these products and oftentimes the names of the products are wrong!)

Water: Our solvent.

Sodium Lauroamphoacetate: Also known as disodium lauroamphodiacetate, it's basically the same thing as disodium cocoamphodiacetate only with "lauro" in place of "coco". In alkaline (over pH 8) products it will behave as an anionic surfactant and have good detergency. In acidic (under pH 6) products, it will behave as a cationic surfactant which will increase mildness and be substantive to our hair and skin, making it feel more conditioned. It's generally used at 1% to 50% in surfactant products, and can be used as a primary or secondary surfactant.

Sodium Trideceth Sulfate: Also known as sodium tridecyl ether sulfate, it's an alkyl ether sulfate like sodium laureth sulfate. It's considered a mild cleanser. It can also behave as an emulsifier for small amounts of oil.

Limnanthes Alba (Meadowfoam) Seed Oil: A light feeling oil that has a very long shelf life of up to two years despite loads of double bonded fatty acids

Coco-Glucoside: A non-ionic surfactant like decyl glucoside, these are considered very mild cleansers. It is derived from coconuts and is used to increase foaming and act as an emulsifier. It has a high pH, so you'll have to bring it down with some citric acid.

Coconut Alcohol:  Okay, this is playing with the rules because there's no such thing as coconut alcohol under INCI names. You have to use something like lauric alcohol or myristic alcohol or something like that, not "coconut alcohol". Okay, we get it, it came from coconuts, but what is it really? So many things are derived from coconuts, it's not fair not to give us the information. (On the official site they call it "cocos nucifera (coconut) alcohol", so no help there!) I'm going with the idea that it is probably lauric alcohol or myristic alcohol or another alcohol like stearyl alcohol.

Peg-120 Methyl Glucose Dioleate: This is sold as Glucamate DOE-120 (flakes or syrup) and it's a thickener for the surfactants. We could use another thickener in its place if you don't have this ingredient, like Crothix.

Aniba Rosaeodora (Rosewood) Wood Oil, Geranium Maculatum Oil, Guaiac (Guaiacum Officinale) Extract, Cymbopogon Martini (Palmarosa) Oil, Rosa Damascena Extract, Amyris Balsamifera (Balsam Torchwood) Bark Oil, Santalum Album (Sandalwood) Oil, Salvia Officinalis (Sage) Oil, Cinnamomum Cassia Leaf Oil, Anthemis Nobilis Flower Oil (Roman chamomile), Daucus Carota Sativa (Carrot) Seed Oil, Piper Nigrum (Pepper) Seed Extract: Various essential oils. (I'm not sure I'd want cinnamon and pepper on my face, but then again I hate pepper!)

Polysorbate 20: A high HLB emulsifier used to solubilize and disperse the oils and essential oils.

Glycerin: Our humectant. It could be part of another ingredient based on the fact that it's so far down the list.

Carbomer: This is a gelling agent used to make gels out of our products. Here's a post on how I make gels with surfactants. 

Triethanolamine: pH adjuster and thickener of carbomers. I'm thinking it's used for the latter.

Methylparaben, Propylparaben, Imidazolidinyl Urea: Preservatives!

Citric acid: pH adjuster (makes it more acidic, reduces pH).

Yellow 5 (Ci 19140): Colour.

So what do we have here? We have a cleanser filled with really mild surfactants - ones we would normally use as secondary surfactants - thickened with Glucamate DOE-120 and carbomer. There's something called coconut alcohol that I can't quite figure out - I'm thinking I'll use glycol distearate in its place if we want a pearlized product or a water soluble ester for moisturizing. We have a ton of extracts and essential oils that are solubilized with the polysorbate 20, and some meadowfoam seed oil.

Where does the 1% list start? Where the essential oils and extracts start. There's no way there is more than 1% of each of those ingredients in this product, so it's safe to say that's where we'll begin.

A side note on making the gel: I have concerns about using TEA as the reactant to gel the carbomer because it can raise pH. This is going to be a high pH product as it is, and if you don't have a pH meter, you won't know exactly how out of whack it might be. Coco-glucoside and disodium lauroamphodiacetate have really pH levels as it is, and given that they are in this product at higher than 5%, we're going to get a high pH product. So I'm going to use lye as the gel making thing. 

I'm going to use 1% carbomer and 1% 18% lye solution (dissolve 18% lye into 82% water and you have an 18% lye solution) to create the gel. Make sure you make this product in the right order because if you put the gel in last, you won't get much gelling.

Okay, let's create a duplicate recipe for this product.

Oh, one quick note! I'm sure they are using 10% or less of each surfactant, but I find I like more surfactants in my products, so I'm using 10% each of the two main surfactants and 5% of the third one.

And as another note, if you don't want to thicken this with gel or Glucamate (or Crothix), this would make a really nice foamer bottle recipe. I'd go with that option as it's easier! And feel free to substitute some of the water for aloe vera (I'd go with 10%) or hydrosols (lavender and chamomile are always nice for all skin types, and orange is nice for oily skin types).

POSSIBLE DUPLICATE FOR PURITY MADE SIMPLE CLEANSER
WATER PHASE
65% distilled water
10% disodium lauroamphodiacetate or disodium cocoamphodiacetate (or cocamidopropyl betaine)
10% sodium trieth sulfate (or sodium laureth sulfate or ammonium laureth sulfate)
5% meadowfoam seed oil
3% coco-glucoside or decyl glucoside
2% glycol distearate or other pearlizing ingredient (optional)
0.5% glycerin
1% carbomer
1% 18% lye solution

COOL DOWN PHASE
1% essential oil
1% polysorbate 20
0.5% preservative

Optional: Glucamate or Crothix or some other thickener you like at suggested usage rates.

Put the surfactants, oil, glycol distearate, and glycerin into a heatproof container and heat until the glycol distearate has melted really well. Remove from heat and allow to cool (this could take a while). If you aren't using the glycol distearate, ignore this step and go to the next one.

Mix the water and carbomer together and make sure you wet all the flakes. Depending on the type of carbomer, you could be waiting 3 to 20 minutes to ensure it's saturated. Add the 18% lye solution and stir really well until you get a gel. Add the surfactants and mix well.

In a small container, weigh whatever essential oils you want in the product into a small container. Add an equal amount of polysorbate 20 and mix well. Add to the gel mixture, then add the preservative, and you're done! Maybe...

If you want this to be thicker, wait until it has reached room temperature and then add your Crothix 0.5% at a time. I know this seems very low, but Crothix can make your product turn from watery to Jell-O in 0.5%. Make sure you stir it really well from the bottom of the container up because Crothix will go right to the bottom and stay there if you don't stir it well. You'll think the mixture is still really watery but in fact the Crothix is lurking there waiting to thicken it up!

If you want to make this for a foamer bottle, leave out the thickener, glycol distearate, and gel and make up those amounts in water.

Join me tomorrow for more duplicating fun with Ojon's 2 minute revitalizing hair mask!

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