Ingredient Spotlight: Lemon Peel Bioferment

Did you know that almost every skin brightener is plant based? Even synthetic chemicals that skincare companies use to brighten skin were first found in plants. Utilizing whole plant extracts gives us even more beneficial compounds that our skin can absorb and use to stay healthy. 

BIOFERMENTATION

New plant technologies based on ancient wisdom like fermentation are bringing us ingredients that have multiple actions. Lemon Peel Bioferment is an excellent example of this.

Did you ever spritz lemon juice on your hair and then sit in the sun for some quick summer highlights? Back in the early '90's my sister and I would do that every day in the spring and it worked! Unfortunately, if you get the juice on your skin, it can cause dark spots with sun exposure. But when applied at night, citrus will lighten the skin. It's pretty fascinating, right? Lemons and other citrus have chemical components in both their peels and the juice that lighten skin and hair, but they also have chemicals like citral and geraniol that can be both irritating and phototoxic.

Here's where fermentation and steam-distillation come into play.

To create a lemon peel bioferment, whole lemon fruit is macerated (mashed up) and incubated with Lactobacillus lacti (the same bacteria used to make yogurt). This creates a prebiotic - something our skin can use to maintain healthy flora and strengthen our moisture barrier.

Removing the irritants.

This bio-ferment is then steam distilled to remove citral and geraniol - the chemicals that can cause skin irritation and phototoxicity. The resulting Lemon Peel Bioferment has both strong antioxidant and skin lightening properties without the known irritation that citrus oils can cause. It also doesn't cause hyperpigmentation if you apply it to your skin and then step into the sun. 

We add this wonder ingredient to our Ultra C Serum where it gently and effectively brightens our skin! 

The vitamin C extracts that we use in our Ultra C Serum are also steam distilled to remove the phototoxic components, so the serum is safe to use in the morning. In fact, we recommend using the Ultra C Serum as your first leave-on product every day. When exposed to the sun's UV rays, the ferulic acid in the serum is activated, which boosts its skin brightening and protective abilities. Ferulic acid is a rice extract.

Aren't plants amazing? We sure think so!

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