Authors: Julie Gabriel
Tags: #ebook, #book
For organic bathroom staples, head to the largest online pharmacy, which is
Drugstore.com
. It has a cute “Green&Natural” tab with a green leaf on the home page, with green offerings including Burt’s Bees, Juice Organics, Seventh Generation, Avalon Organics, Weleda, Desert Essence, Earth Science, Kiss My Face, Nature’s Gate Organics, Annemarie Borlind, Ecco Bella, Zia Natural Skincare, Frownies, JASON Organic Products, Rachel Perry, Alba Botanica, and Moom Organic Hair Removal. Other natural products to note include Natracare (organic feminine hygiene products), Chicken Poop lip balms, Baby’s Only organic baby formulas, and nontoxic house cleaning products by Method.
Beauty.com
specializes in more upscale brands, and its natural section includes Inara Organics, Astara, Caudalie, Lavanila, Juice Beauty, John Masters Organics, BORBA, Malie Kauai, and Crabtree & Evelyn. All ingredients are clearly listed, so you see what you are buying. Both sites have decent shipping charges and convenient return policies.
This online shopping empire features such brands as Pangea Organics, Juice Beauty, Crabtree & Evelyn, John Masters Organics, Dr. Hauschka, BORBA, Nvey Eco, Organic Bath Company, Davie’s Gate, Erbaviva, Bare Escentuals, Jo Wood Organics, Suki, Weleda, and Eminence. Shipping charges and delivery time vary from retailer to retailer, but the overall experience is pleasant, and you can spread the word about organic beauty by leaving reviews.
Sephora earns extra kudos for consistent listing of ingredients and clear, accurate color swatches. Sometimes the online shopping experience is far more pleasant than dawdling around the store and bickering with sales associates who cannot always grasp why you want a humble Dr. Hauschka’s lotion if there’s such a gorgeous, shimmering, luxuriously smelling and fast-absorbing dermatologist-tested cream that “contains natural ingredients.” Green brands handpicked by Sephora experts include CARE by Stella McCartney, Juice Beauty, Bare Escentuals, CARGO, Lavanila, Nvey Eco, and Caudalie.
This is the route to take when you want to save up to 50 percent on organic beauty products, create your own green cosmetic products from scratch, or try a new, niche brand. Many stores sell organic beauty products with a substantial discount, although shipping charges may be on the high end, and be prepared to receive a Dr. Hauschka lotion from Germany with instructions in German, or even to spend up to a month waiting for your purchase or not receive it at all.
A word of online shopping wisdom: be ruthless and file the claim with PayPal after ten days of waiting. But the savings make it all worth the trouble. I head to eBay for plant hydrosols for toners and masks, rare and discontinued Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab perfume oils, powdered plant extracts for creams and hair treatments, pure henna, inexpensive antioxidants, organic soy wax chips for homemade candles, organic essential oils from all over the world, and, of course, for vintage perfume bottles or cobalt glass jars that will contain my homemade beauty creations.
Skin Actives Scientific (
www.SkinActives.com
)
If you are a cosmetic DIY enthusiast, make this online store your source of continual inspiration. All Skin Actives products are synthesized in an Arizona lab by acclaimed chemist and research scientist Dr. Hannah Sivak and her team.
Be prepared to frantically jump from one active to another, pretty much like a kid in a candy store: active ingredients include potent antioxidants idebenone, kinetin, resveratrol, and green tea extracts; collagen boosters matrixyl and epidermal growth factor; antiwrinkle
Boswellia serrata
and hyaluronic acid; anti-inflammatory bisabolol and copper peptide, and the bestselling fermented sea kelp that will allow you to prepare your Creme De La Mer duplicate without petrochemicals or parabens. All active ingredients are shipped in sterile containers, complete with detailed instructions, pipettes, and spatulas.
If you prefer to blend your masks and toners from scratch, head over to this online store that has been selling certified organic plant extracts, essential oils, and hydrosols since 1987. Aloe vera gel, almond meal, borax powder, castile soap, witch hazel, vegetable glycerine, and all other basic cosmetic ingredients are sold in various amounts, depending on your needs. You will find bulk organic herbs and spices, butters, waxes, carrier oils, clays, natural flavors, boxes and bottles, as well as seaweeds, sprouting seeds, and herbal teas to complete your green journey. The store has a no-hassle return policy and reasonable shipping fees.
There Must Be a Better Way Ltd.
(
theremustbeabetterway.co.uk
)
This humble Brit store sells rare, hard-to-find organic labels, such as Mother Earth, Living Nature, Eselle, Miessense, and Logona. You can also find Britain’s own organic creations here, including Spiezia, Green People, and Trevarno, alongside bestselling Weleda, Aubrey Organics, and Dr. Bron-ner’s Magic Soaps. Try this store if you are looking for products that are not available in North America, including hidden treasures such as rare (and probably discontinued) Burt’s Bees Vitamin E Body and Bath Oil, Weleda Aloe Body Lotion, and the ingenuous mineral shampoo Logona Ghassoul Clay Powder. The store ships worldwide, but shipping charges are on the higher side, especially if you buy more than 5 pounds of green goodies.
Additional Online Green Resources
The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics
(
www.safecosmetics.org
) is a coalition of public health, educational, religious, labor, women’s, environmental, and consumer groups that aims to protect our health by requiring the health and beauty industry to phase out chemicals linked to cancer, birth defects, and other health problems, and replace them with safer alternatives.
Department of Health and Human Services’ Agency for Toxic Substances
& Disease Registry (ATSDR) Tox FAQs
(
www.atsdr.cdc.gov/toxfaq.html
) is a series of summaries about hazardous substances developed by the ATSDR Division of Toxicology. Information for this series is excerpted from the ATSDR Toxicological Profiles and Public Health Statements. Each fact sheet serves as a quick and easy-to-understand guide.
Environmental Working Group’s Body Burden Studies
(
ewg.org/reports/bodyburden2/execsumm.php
) provides information on EWG’s Human Tox-ome Project and its various body burden studies of more than five hundred chemicals in babies, children, and adults.
Environmental Working Group’s National Tap Water Quality Database
(
www.ewg.org/tapwater
) contains data on drinking water contamination for more than 39,751 water utilities in forty-two states through contact with state environmental and health agencies. For the first time ever, you will see how your tap water measures up against other cities and towns throughout the United States.
Environmental Working Group’s Shopper’s Food Guide
(
www.food news.org
) teaches about the “best and worst” food products, and explains how to buy and eat healthier from EWG’s analysis of forty thousand government tests of pesticides in popular fruits and vegetables.
Environmental Working Group’s Skin Deep Database on Safe Personal
Care Products
(
www.cosmeticdatabase.com
) is the most complete, interactive guide to personal care product safety. It checks the safety of ingredients in nearly twenty-five thousand cosmetic products by looking into fifty toxicity and regulatory databases, making it the largest data resource of its kind. You can search by cosmetic product, brand, or an ingredient.
Healthy Child, Healthy World
(
www.healthychild.org
) is dedicated to protecting the health and well-being of children from harmful environmental exposures. It educates parents, supports protective policies, and engages communities to make responsible decisions, simple everyday choices, and well-informed lifestyle improvements to create healthy environments where children and families can flourish.
Our Stolen Future
(
www.ourstolenfuture.org
) provides a host of information about a new category of toxic chemicals called endocrine disruptors. Many man-made chemicals fall into this category—chemicals that in some way block, trigger, or change our normal endocrine function.
Scorecard
(
www.scorecard.org
) provides an in-depth pollution report for your state or town, covering air, water, chemicals, and more.
Toxicology Data Network
(TOXNET) (
www.toxnet.nlm.nih.gov
) is another great way to check the toxic potential of chemical ingredients in your cosmetic products.
To report adverse side effects in cosmetics, contact these organizations:
CFSAN Adverse Event Reporting System (CAERS)
Phone: 301-436-2405
E-mail: CAERS@
cfsan.fda.gov
British Association of Dermatologists
Willan House, 4 Fitzroy Square, London W1T 5HQ
Phone: 0207-383-0266
E-mail: admin@
bad.org.uk
Green Reading
So, you are almost done. Where do you go next? Try these books if you have more questions about living a healthy, ecoconscious lifestyle.
Ausubel, Kenny, ed.
Ecological Medicine: Healing the Earth, Healing Ourselves.
San Francisco: Sierra Club, 2004.
Campbell, T. Colin, with Thomas M. Campbell II.
The China Study: The
Most Comprehensive Study of Nutrition Ever Conducted.
Dallas, TX: BenBella Books, 2006.
Colborn, Theo, Dianne Dumanoski, and John Peterson Myers.
Our Stolen
Future: Are We Threatening Our Fertility, Intelligence, and Survival?
A Scientific Detective Story
. New York: Plume, 1997.
Cox, Jeff.
The Organic Cook’s Bible.
Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2006.
Dadd, Debra Lynn.
Home Safe Home: Creating a Healthy Home Environment
by Reducing Exposure to Toxic Household Products.
New York: Tarcher/Putnam, 2007.
Fagin, Dan, Marianne Lavelle, and the Center for Public Integrity.
Toxic
Deception: How the Chemical Industry Manipulates Science, Bends
the Law, and Endangers Your Health.
Monroe, ME: Common Courage, 1999.
Goodall, Jane.
Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating.
New York: Wellness Central, 2006.
Gore, Al.
Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit.
New York: Rodale, 2006.
———.
An Inconvenient Truth.
New York: Rodale, 2006.
Hicks, India.
Island Beauty
. London: Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2006.
Krimsky, Sheldon.
Science in the Private Interest: Has the Lure of Profits
Corrupted Biomedical Research?
Lanham, MD: Rowman & Little-field, 2004.
Kurz, Susan West.
Awakening Beauty, the Dr. Hauschka Way.
New York: Clarkson Potter, 2006.
Malkan, Stacy.
Not Just a Pretty Face: The Ugly Side of the Beauty Industry.
Gabriola Island, Canada: New Society, 2007.
Markowitz, Gerald, and David Rosner.
Deceit and Denial: The Deadly
Politics of Industrial Pollution.
Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003.
Nestle, Marion.
Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition
and Health.
Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2007.
Pollan, Michael.
The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four
Meals.
New York: Penguin, 2007.
Schlosser, Eric.
Fast Food Nation.
New York: Harper Perennial, 2005.
appendix b
100 toxic cosmetic
ingredients you don't want in your beauty products
Here’s the most comprehensive list of harmful chemicals currently used in skincare, hair care, makeup, and fragrances. Use this list anytime you buy a beauty product. Don’t keep it secret: photocopy it and give it to your family and friends. Minimize your exposure to these chemicals. Ideally, eliminate them from your beauty routine. They are the worst enemies of your skin and hair.
1.
Acrylic Acid
: respiratory toxin for humans; causes asthma, severe skin burns, and allergic reaction in the skin or lungs; causes renal and kidney damage in animals; causes blood tumors and skin tumors in animals
2.
Aluminum (Pure Aluminum Powder)
: strong human neurotoxicant; causes irritation of eyes, skin, and lungs; endocrine disruptor; linked to Alzheimer’s disease and breast cancer; causes birth disorders in animals
3.
Aluminium Chloride
: nose and lung irritant; causes liver and bladder abnormalities in animals; causes brain disorders in animals; human endocrine disruptor linked to breast cancer and Alzheimer’s disease; aluminum compounds are neurotoxic to humans
4.
Aluminium Hydrochloride
: endocrine disruptor linked to breast cancer and Alzheimer’s disease; aluminum compounds are neurotoxic to humans
5.
Aluminium Oxide
: strong nose and lung irritant; causes skin cancer in animals; endocrine disruptor linked to breast cancer and Alzheimer’s disease; aluminum compounds are neurotoxic to humans
6.
Ammonium Laureth Sulfate
: causes skin irritation; water contaminant; may be contaminated with carcinogen 1,4-Dioxane
7.
Ammonium Persulfate
: strong eye, respiratory system, and skin irritant; can trigger asthma; restricted in cosmetics
8.
Amyl Acetate
: neurotoxin; eye and lung irritant; lung allergen
9.
Benzalkonium Chloride
: immune system, lung, and skin toxicant; can trigger asthma; restricted in Canada and Japan
10.
Benzyl Alcohol
: strong neurotoxicant; can cause allergic reaction in lungs; causes itching, burning, scaling, hives, and blistering of skin; causes liver damage, coma, and death in animals