Honey soap is becoming increasingly popular. Honey has been part of our kitchen cupboards for many years now, and we’re happy to call on it for help with colds and sore throats. But the nectar also proves to be a real ally in cosmetics. But why opt for honey soap? Answers from O’Naturalis.
Where does honey come from?
With the return of summer, millions of bees set out to gather the precious nectar they need to make honey from the flowers in our gardens.
Since time immemorial, people have harvested this natural product for their own consumption. Today, honey can be found in many traditional culinary dishes, as well as in cosmetic preparations. What are the reasons for this? O’Naturalis draws up a non-exhaustive inventory of the many virtues of this precious golden liquid.
What are the cosmetic benefits of honey?
The fruit of the meticulous work of bees, honey derives its benefits from the nectar of the flowers used to prepare it. In cosmetics, this nectar has many benefits:
Purifying action
Honey soap is the soap that makes everyone agree. Honey’s powerful cleansing properties remove toxins without harming the skin. So, honey soap is just as suitable for sensitive, fragile skin as it is for oily or acne-prone skin .
An effective moisturizer
Hydrating properties are naturally present in honey. However, their concentration is highly dependent on where the honey is harvested. As this RTBF article points out, “The place of harvest (…) determines the quantity of minerals that the bees have been led to draw from nature to enrich their production.” Hence the importance of choosing the right beekeepers to work with. We’ll come back to this…
Support for healing
Honey’s antibacterial properties give it natural healing power, while purifying the epidermis. In fact, it’s not uncommon to use it as a poultice on a small wound to accelerate skin repair.
Your anti-aging ally
Honey’s many components contribute to skin regeneration and support our body’s natural production of collagen. The benefits of using honey in cosmetics are immediately clear.
What about O’Naturalis?
Honey is a 100% natural ingredient. That’s all it took to convince us to design a honey-based soap to take advantage of its many benefits. But we couldn’t work with just any product!
If you already know us, you’ll know that we place great importance on product quality, and that we use mainly organic ingredients. But for honey, it’s a bit special… As the newspaper L’Avenir pointed out in an article of April 15, 2021, “there is hardly any Belgian organic honey. On the other hand, many local beekeepers produce this nectar in the traditional way.”
And it’s precisely with these lovers of good products that we’ve chosen to work exclusively. They all live in our region and have chosen to work in a way that is as respectful as possible of the environment and the bees that inhabit their hives. And all this, of course, speaks to us at O’Naturalis!
Would you like to try O’Naturalis honey soap?
When it comes to honey soaps, O’Naturalis offers you the gentle O’Melia, a cold-saponified soap(find all our explanations on the benefits of cold saponification here), with lots of gentleness and patience to make the most of the benefits offered by the sweet nectar. Why do we love it? Because, thanks to a skilful blend of shea butter, beeswax and honey, O’Melia is a gentle, emollient soap suitable for the whole family, including babies and mothers-to-be.
SOS bees in danger
Bee populations are in danger. As reported in an article by the United Nations Regional Information Centre, “the rate of bee extinction is 100 to 1,000 times higher than normal”. The cause? Human activity and climate change. And yet, according to the same article, these tiny insects are essential to the balance of life on Earth. To try and reverse the trend, everyone can do their bit. You can, for example … :
- Embellish your gardens and balconies with melliferous flowers. This will delight nearby bees. Ready-made mixes are available from garden centers.
- Sponsor bees or a hive. In this way, you’ll be helping to ensure the survival of insects in your region. Various programs exist in Belgium. These include L’Abeille est dans le pré, a beekeeper in Saint-Georges, near Liège, who offers to sponsor his bees, and Alterapi, which proposes concrete solutions to support the local ecosystem. Don’t hesitate to contact them for more information.
