Earlier in the summer, I had the delight to be invited to attend Evolve‘s Sustainable Beauty Symposium. I have worked with Evolve in the past, and I love their Ethos. They make small batches of skincare by hand in their studio in Hertfordshire. They use recyclable materials, eco products, vegan and are transparent. You can read their 2021 sustainability report here.
We arrived at the absolutely beautiful Home Farm Glamping – our venue for the day (which I am fully planning on revisiting on my own in the future). The day started with two panels. The first panel discussed regenerative beauty and how the industry can put more back which will feature Evolve, UpCircle, Subtract and the Soil Association. Something interesting that I learned was that The Soil Association has to trace all orgins. Scop 1 and 2 correspond to what you are using (ie diesel) whilst Scope 3 is what you create. Also that in order to reach net zero you need a 6% reduction year on year.
The second panel was a more collaborative approach on how beauty brands can get to net zero featuring Evolve, Bybi, Plenaire, Climate Partners and Provenance. Their aim is to create a pathway for brands to reach net zero as there is no formal documentation on this topic currently.
The panels were incredibly interesting and raised a lot of questions for me:
How do you reach net zero in beauty?
How do you not offload the burden onto the consumer? Has the climate around this changed at all post-pandemic? Can you balance being a commercial business with being sustainable?
Is it more sustainable to use glass over plastic when there is no UK glass industry anymore (realistically) so all glass needs to be made and imported from abroad?
Realistically, there’s an environmental impact every time someone buys a product. Demonising one specific ingredient is not helpful.
After the panels, we broke for lunch – a delicious vegetarian and vegan spread – before heading off for a afternoon workshops. There was a mix of Evolve facial treatments, yoga, sound baths, energy meditations, bespoke oil blending and mist making.
In my time running this blog, I have been to many, many events. And I can, hand over heart, say that this is one of the best events that I have ever attended. Bravo!
In case you were struggling to find any sustainable makeup recommendations in addition to skincare, I spoke to a makeup artist who specialises in sustainable beauty and these were her recommendations:
Nude
Sculpted by Amy
Tropic
I left the day with a lot of thoughts to mull over about sustainable beauty. In a lot of cases there is no right or wrong answer, but that’s what makes green industries both so difficult and so exciting at the same time.
What are your feelings about sustainable beauty?
