Our 2023 Favorites
We’re not quite sure why, but 2023 feels like it’s dragged for a while. Usually the end of the year happens quickly, but not this one. The good part of this is that we’ve had ample time to reflect on the products we’ve loved this year. And fret not, if you need to save these products for later, we’re adding them all to our shop section so you can always peruse them whenever you need.
Fragrance in general has been the biggest gainer in beauty, and we’re firmly planted into seeing how the future of wellness fragrances plays out. The Nue Co’s Functional Fragrance is an exceptional statement on the power of functional fragrances. It’s formulated to lower stress, and is designed by a perfumer so it actually smells like a perfume, rather than a mix of essential oils.
And it does both things well. The scent profile of calming cardamom, with uplifting bergamot, and a plethora of notes in between is both soothing, and sophisticated. We love it for its functional wellness benefits, but would love it regardless as it actually is one of the nicest fragrances (functional or not) that we’ve experienced this year.
If there is any trend we foresee coming in 2024, it’s that scalp care is the next frontier of skin care. The scalp is 5 to 6 times more prone to skin aging than anywhere else, and beyond shampoo and conditioner, which only partially address scalp health, we don’t really do anything about it.
Act + Acre’s Scalp Detox is an appropriately beneficial plant oil product that both deep conditions the scalp, calms irritation (relieves itchy scalp in a pinch), and keeps the scalp happy and dandruff free without harsh chemicals. It’s a wonderful weekly treatment.
When it comes to natural deodorants, it’s the pits (pun intended). The selections either smell a bit too much like an herbal concoction of essential oils, or they don’t last long enough to be worth their weight. Not Corpus, which is by far, our favorite clean deodorant brand. Their scents are beautifully done, much more akin to a Parisian fragrance house than a Whole Food aisle find. And their formula, a gel stick deodorant is baking soda free so it doesn’t aggravate, cause itchiness, or leave white streaks.
Nº GREEN is decided fresh, vibrant, and green. With bergamot, pink lemon, orange blossom, cardamom for a deeply swoon-worthy profile that will delight through the day.
We’re big fans when a moisturizer can do something more than moisturize. And Royal Fern’s Phytoactive Cream is created with their signature Royal Fern plant complex which provides antioxidant protection against collagen and elastin breakdown, while minimizing uneven pigmentation for a radiant, firmer complexion.
Also, this cream just smells fresh and clean. Like the perfect antidote to a long day.
We’re big face mist users, and generally find no fault with most of the ones that come across our desk. However, In Fiore’s Vitale is different. Its potency with plant extracts and bitter orange waters can be felt right away.
It’s not often a face mist can be described as powerful, but Vitale is appropriately so.
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iS Clinical is known for making reliably effective products, without frills. Their Cleansing Complex is a comforting gel cleanser that feels refreshing, non-stripping, and skin awakening.
Although gentle, there are natural sources of AHAs and BHAs which provide acid-based exfoliation, bypassing the need for frequent acid toning.
Not only is this undoubtedly the sunscreen of the year, we might say it’s the product of the year. Beauty of Joseon’s sunscreen is the definition of a word-of-mouth hit, recommended first in close circles of KBeauty fans, and beauty industry insiders before it swept over the beauty community and became the most searched for sunscreen on Amazon, and TikTok.
Why does everyone love it? The cream is light, and fast absorbing, and gives a your-skin-but-better dewy finish. The sun protection actives are modern Korean standard filters that are much more gentle than US filters, while providing good protection. And the formula also focuses on skin healthy ingredients like a 30% rice extract, and fermented actives. It’s everything one could want in a sunscreen.
In an era of greens powders, probiotics, and other newfangled supplements that are supposed to solve our wellness quandaries, we’re more than ever, fans of MIJA’s Superstar, a nutritionist formulated daily ingestible designed as a one-and-done that fills the clinical nutrition gaps and makes up for universal dietary shortfalls we are likely to have in just 2 teaspoons a day.
This entirely organic superfood based formula has proven to be more comprehensive for gut health than probiotics, more multi-facted than greens powders, and as other brands like AG1 and Mud/Wtr have seen some push back on quality, and customer satisfaction, MIJA has accumulated a growing legion of dietitian and nutritionist backed recommendations.
Another face mist? Yes, but we swear this one belongs. We’ve used it time and time again, and the F. Miller Toning Mist is just so nice. It smells like a garden, provides a feeling of hydration like a rain shower just happened, and there is this feeling each time we use it that we just want to savor every droplet that graces our skin. Is it hydrating? Yes. Is it full of antioxidants? Yes. But more so, it’s just beautiful magic.
Has there been a bigger blockbuster beauty product in recent years than Augustinus Bader’s cream, a.k.a, the Cream that launched this billion-dollar valued brand?
The Cream is an exercise is doing everything well. It has the perfect consistency, not too thick that it feels suffocating, though not too thin that one would feel it wasn’t moisturizing, it spreads with an effortless gloss that is quick absorbing, never greasy, and it layers like a dream under makeup and sunscreen.
Supernal’s Cosmic Glow Oil is perfectly slated for 2023, or what we’d consider a very transitional year as we shift in many ways post-pandemic, figuring out a on-and-off recession, and a growing feeling of uncertainty.
Cosmic Glow Oil is comforting in its plush, nourishing oils. It offers a clear value proposition, to make your skin glow from the nutritious and nourishing plant oils, no other out-of-this-world statements. And it works marvelously. This beautiful oil is just so good, and will win you over.
Here’s what you need to know about Auteur: it’s not for the casual beauty person. At $230 for a bottle of this mask, this is for those seeking serious skin therapy. And Definitive Optimising Mask contains the actives that command this price point with skin-smoothing, wrinkle-reducing peptides, hydrating hyaluronic acid, and an acid complex for cell turnover, each treatment is basically a time machine.
Pro tip: Want to savor the mask? Get your money’s worth and use this beautifully textured moisturizing cream as an overnight moisture mask.
