Weleda is a natural household name, but to be honest I haven’t tried all that many products from the collection. Nevertheless, there are a few products that have gone on to become regulars in our house.
Weleda was founded in 1921 by the Austrian philosopher and natural scientist, Rudolf Steiner, Dutch doctor Ita Wegman and Oskar Schmiedel, a chemist and pharmacist from Munich in Germany. The company and its modern operations is still based on the philosophic ideology and high values of their discipline, anthroposophy.
Anthroposophy is a spiritual worldview with European roots, now established all over the world. It was named and formulated by Weleda’s founder Rudolf Steiner, who translated the name to mean ‘the wisdom of man’. By contrast to some present-day practice in academic and university circles, Steiner used the term to refer to the investigation of the spiritual realm through scientific and spiritual experience, and it was this to which he devoted his work. Steiner’s anthroposophy takes its starting point from exact scientific thinking, with equally exact research methods, initially limited to the world of matter, then extended to the spiritual through science.
Here are my three favourite Weleda products.
I love this deodorant! Its main ingredient is alcohol though, and I’m still unsure whether we should be using beauty products with alcohol in them. For my armpits it’s not so much of an issue however, it’s more when it comes to skincare that I have my concerns….
The wild damask rose essential oil gives a beautiful scent, and lasts a long time. I use this as a body/clothes spray on hot days to help keep fresh!
We went through a stage of having purely liquid soaps in our house by the sink, I’m pleased to say now that we are mixing it up a bit in the soap department! This soap creates a really rich lather, and unlike some natural soaps whose essential oil fragrances seem to escape them no sooner than you unwrap the bar, the lavender fragrance remains to the very end of the bar.
As well as lavender there are several skin calming and conditioning ingredients including iris, chamomile and viola tricolor. It does leave hands feeling conditioned, not dry as some other soaps can.
Weleda Skin Food is celebrating its 90th birthday! Now, this is a skincare product that does contain alcohol. I am inclined to agree with Sarah Brown, founder of Pai on the use of alcohol in beauty products (read more here), but I don’t use this product every day so figure it’s OK to use now and then. Weleda Skin Food really does work; it’s great for dry feet and hands (and knees and elbows), as well as dry patches elsewhere. It’s a really rich cream with base oils of sunflower and sweet almond oil, plus beeswax and flower extracts of viola tricolor, calendula and chamomile.
This product despite containing alcohol does not dry my skin, but I do wonder if Weleda would consider not using alcohol in their formulas; not the deodorant, but the skincare products definitely! I am sure this would encourage more label-scrutinising customers to buy their products, but on the other hand, Weleda is a highly successful company (sold in 50 countries on all 5 continents!) and their formulas are well-researched and the brand is steeped in history. As the saying goes, if it ain’t broke…