Our story

What do contemporary natural cosmetics have in common with our grandmothers’ and great-grandmothers’ hand-made ointments? It is something basic yet so hard to achieve today: the purely natural origin of our plant ingredients. Due to the development of agriculture and environmental pollution, not all crops, or even wild-growing plants, can be used as a raw ingredient for natural cosmetics. If pesticides have been used in the vicinity, or the crop is grown near a busy road, this is enough for plants to lose their precious properties or even to become harmful.

A century ago there was no doubt that plants growing in a meadow were natural. Today, ecologically pure plants are much less common and only testing can prove if they are a ‘pure’ enough material to produce natural cosmetics. D'ALCHÉMY’s formulations are based on organically grown or wild growing plants from environmentally clean areas. This is confirmed, for instance, by organic certificates for our raw ingredients, issued by independent international organisations. The processes to which natural raw ingredients are subjected during the manufacture of D'ALCHÉMY cosmetics are carefully chosen to preserve the precious plant properties.

Producing quality natural cosmetics is still only a part of the job. We need to have a way to store the cosmetics without compromising their properties. Ordinary glass, seen as the safest means of storage for cosmetics until very recently, does not sufficiently protect the contents against deterioration. That is why D'ALCHÉMY uses special biophotonic glass, which helps preserve the precious properties of vegetable ingredients.

The manufacture of contemporary cosmetics is incomparably more costly and complicated than picking herbs in a meadow and grinding them in a mortar. However, that is why D'ALCHÉMY’s products are so effective and safe.

Looking at natural cosmetics from a different perspective – if virtually all natural substances currently used have been known and used by the inhabitants of the regions where the plants have grown for centuries, can anything new be created in this field?

In the 21st century, manufacturers of natural cosmetics enjoy incomparably easier access to active substances from all over the world. They are not restricted to their region or even continent, and since almost everything is within reach, the knowledge of natural active substances and proper selection becomes even more important. In D'ALCHÉMY cosmetics, we use carefully selected natural substances with a targeted action and well-proven high efficacy. They are sourced from world-renowned suppliers, and the process in which they are obtained is subject to thorough scrutiny. This means that every d’Alchemy cosmetic has a well-defined purpose and achieves that purpose in an effective and safe manner.

Aromatherapy

Aromatherapy is one of the fields of natural medicine from which D'ALCHÉMY draws its knowledge. Aromatherapy means treatment by aromas. However, it is not only about the smells, but about the entire intricate effect that natural essential oils have on a human body. Though the scents of natural oils, often so beautiful, are also of importance...

Aromatherapy produces beneficial health effects by introducing natural plant oils into the human body through the respiratory system and skin. When we are breathing, air with essential oils gets into our lungs, where it comes into contact with the mucous membrane of the alveoli in the lungs and is absorbed relatively quickly by the blood and subsequently by internal organs (this mechanism is used, for instance, in climate therapy, such as walks in pine forests). Essential oils are so penetrating that even when applied onto skin, they can pass through the stratum corneum and, like in the case of inhaling, migrate into blood and integral organs.

Owing to the wide variety of essential oils, aromatherapy is effective not only in treating health conditions and problems, but also in skin care. This is precisely the phenomenon D'ALCHÉMYuses in its cosmetics – essential oils work actively on the skin, while synergically enhancing the action of the other active ingredients of the cosmetic.

Plant Hydrosols

In D'ALCHÉMY cosmetics, there is no room for unnecessary ingredients. Every ingredient of a cosmetic contributes to its effective action. Even the carrier in which the active substances are dissolved – which is usually water in other natural cosmetics – is a plant hydrosol in the case of D'ALCHÉMY cosmetics, a natural extract from substances obtained from plants, containing small amounts of natural mineral salts and essential oils. Therefore, the hydrosol as a carrier is also an active ingredient.

Water is the most commonly used carrier for active substances. Most ingredients used to produce cosmetics are dissolved in water. Water – pure water (either spring or demineralised water) – is harmless, but also neutral, deprived of any value aside from that conveyed by the cosmetic ingredients dissolved in it.

Therefore, D'ALCHÉMY beauty care cosmetics are based only on plant hydrosols. With the exception of some rinse-out formulae, such as wash gels, soaps or shampoos, we do not use ordinary water to make our beauty care cosmetics, assuming that each substance applied to (and left on) skin should be as valuable as possible.

Plant hydrosols are derivatives of plant fluids. The fluids circulating in plants deliver substances necessary for plant life and growth to cells in all the different parts of plants. They carry trace elements absorbed by the roots from soil, and photosynthesis products generated by leaves. Plant hydrosols are a valuable composition of small amounts of natural plant extracts, mineral salts, and essential oils. This composition differs from one plant species to another. What is more, even plants of the same species might vary in terms of the composition of their fluids, depending on the conditions they grow in: sunlight, temperature, soil composition or air purity. Due to their affinity to human bodily fluids, plant hydrosols penetrate deep into skin cells more easily than pure mineral or distilled waters. This means that they are also more effective as carriers of active substances.

As a cosmetic base, plant hydrosols are much more valuable than pure water, while also well-tolerated by people with sensitive skin. Containing precious vitamins and minerals, with their composition and proportions designed by nature itself, they are easily absorbed by skin cells, enhancing the natural vital energy and regenerative capacity of the skin. For instance, rose and neroli hydrosols are highly valued in therapies aimed at mature, sensitive skin with dilated capillaries, and lavender hydrosol is used in cases of skin irritation or infections.

D'ALCHÉMY is one of few cosmetics companies in the world that use plant hydrosols as a base for their beauty care products, applying them consciously as a replacement for pure water.

Laboratory tests

Innovative cosmetics by D'ALCHÉMY also differ from home-made formulae in terms of their purity, reproducibility, biovitality and stability. Natural substances obtained from plants using state-of-the-art technologies are used to produce D'ALCHÉMY cosmetics. This way, pure active ingredients can be obtained with consistent concentrations. The ‘power’ of the natural substances used by D'ALCHÉMY remains the same, and the effects of every D'ALCHÉMYcosmetic are reproducible, no matter what batch of plants was used. Therefore, the efficacy and effects of those cosmetics can be examined and verified in an objective manner. With such innovative manufacturing technologies, the biovitality of D'ALCHÉMY’s formulae is comparable to that of the plants from which they are derived. The manufacturing conditions are strictly controlled and set up in such a manner that the properties of natural ingredients are not altered and, most of all, the strength of their effect on human body, which more recently can be scientifically examined using empirical methods, remains unchanged.

The safety of natural cosmetics depends mostly on the safety of the raw ingredients used to produce them.

D'ALCHÉMY takes exceptional care when selecting the suppliers of natural materials. They are leading European companies, mostly from France, with extensive scientific facilities and specialised laboratories. These companies have been engaged in research (including clinical studies) on the safety and efficacy of raw materials for years. The objectivity and scientific control over research methods contribute to the safety and efficacy of D'ALCHÉMY cosmetics produced on the basis of those ingredients.

The next stage of research, this time done by D'ALCHÉMY, to which all natural ingredients are subjected before they are admitted for production, is aimed at re-checking the microbiological purity of the ingredients. Such research is particularly important in the case of natural materials, which are obtained from a natural source and not in a chemical process.

Before the innovative D'ALCHÉMY formulae can be approved by the research team and released for production, they undergo a series of safety tests. One of them is a stress test (preservation test), which evaluates the effectiveness of the preservation system. A product sample is repeatedly contaminated with microbes, fungi and bacteria, in order to check if the delicate preservative system manages to protect the microbiological purity of the product. Preservation tests allow the minimum effective concentration of the preservative to be chosen (making the product even safer for the user), while ensuring that the cosmetic will be adequately protected against the development of microorganisms when in use. Stress testing takes several weeks, as long as necessary to obtain positive results.

Every D'ALCHÉMY product is also tested in order to prevent the potential for developing skin allergies or contact dermatitis. The testing is carried out by independent dermatologists and begins with an analysis of product documentation. Then a large group of volunteers (selected by dermatologists in accordance with the Helsinki Declaration, EU standards and Cosmetics Europe recommendations and guidance) undergoes patch testing or epidermal testing for several weeks. The tests are aimed at verifying if contact with the cosmetic does not trigger an inflammatory or allergic reaction in the skin.

Biovitality

Being an innovative company aiming to manufacture purely natural yet effective formulations, aside from traditional testing, D'ALCHÉMY subjects its products to pioneering tests which have not been used by the cosmetics industry so far: ‘biovitality’ testing.

Biovitality is a term which until recently had no scientific basis, although it has been intuitively known to people for millennia. Why are some products ‘good’ for people, while other are ‘bad’? Why do the health and condition of our bodies depend so much on what our body takes in? Not long ago, the common notion was that the value of the products absorbed by human body cells depended on their chemical composition: they had to contain appropriate quantities of macromolecules, vitamins (as catalyst of chemical processes) and to deliver energy to the body’s cells. However, scientists and healthy life style enthusiasts alike suspected there was something more to it...

An aid helping to answer this question can be found in the works by Erwin Schrödinger, a Nobel prize winner in physics for the mathematical formulation of wave mechanics. In 1944, he published a book entitled What is Life?. In this book, he states that the basic expression of life is the storage and distribution of biological information. Photons emitted by the cells of living organisms act as information carriers. The photons helping the body to put the information in order are good for people; and those increasing chaos (entropy) are harmful. Over the next years, professor Fritz Albert Popp developed a concept according to which every living organism emits specific electromagnetic radiation with a strong coherence and relatively low intensity. The photons in this kind of radiation are called biophotons. Biophotons coexist with billions of reactions occurring in cells. The more coherent and structured the biophotons are, the more efficient (and less chaotic) the cellular processes become.

Where do the biophotons in the cells of living organisms come from? Plants absorb sunlight and use it in the photosynthesis process. Owing to photosynthesis, they produce organic compounds from non-organic matter, becoming the first – as Fritz Albert Popp called it – ‘light storage’. An organism which absorbs plant cells takes in the light stored in the cell; in turn, when its cells are consumed by another organism, the stored light is passed on. The ‘assimilation’ of light by the cells of subsequent organisms increases its order. However, if the ‘light store’ is subjected to inappropriate processing, especially chemical processes, the biovitality of the cell – which is a function of the level of biophoton emission and biophoton coherence – is reduced.

The terms ‘biophotons’ and ‘biovitality’ became fashionable and some people have begun to use them in a quite arbitrary manner. However, empirical methods have been developed lately to measure biophotons, making biovitality a parametrised and scientifically measurable characteristic. It can be measured empirically using dedicated digital measuring equipment, e.g. on the international André Bovis scale.

For obvious reasons, biophoton measurements are a subject of interest mostly for scientists working in the field of nutrition. For example, it is now possible to compare the biovitality of natural materials and a product derived from them. Reduced biovitality shows how much the natural materials have been processed and how much of their precious properties has not been passed on to the end product.

However, the digestive tract is not the only way through which plant cells are absorbed by the human body. Skin demonstrates such absorption capabilities as well, and since natural cosmetics also emit biophotons, the effectiveness of the impact of the cosmetic on the skin depends on the quantities and order of the biophotons. D'ALCHÉMY was the first manufacturer of natural cosmetics to take up the challenge and effort of testing its cosmetics for biovitality with an innovative method developed with food in mind.

Biophotonic glass

Today, it is hard to imagine a cosmetic that would change its appearance and scent 3 days after you open the jar. However, it is even harder to find a preservation method that would not alter the effects of the cosmetic and would still be safe for humans in every respect. Contemporary natural cosmetics are incomparably more stable than ‘grandma’s’ cosmetics. D’Alchemy achieves this owing to the sterility and precise control of all parameters of the production process and to the extremely careful selection of preservatives, coupled with packaging made of special biophotonic glass.

The more natural cosmetics manufacturers focus on product quality, the more careful they are when choosing the packaging materials. This is not just about being pleasing to the eye, but also about finding a solution to preserve the value of sensitive cosmetics made of naturally sourced ingredients. Towards the end of the 20th century, packaging manufacturers introduced special violet (or biophotonic) glass. Currently, this kind of glass offers maximum protection against degradation for natural products, which cannot compare to any other glass type.

Violet glass owes its extraordinary properties to its colour. The colour of glass determines the light wavelength that can penetrate into the packaging. This is of critical importance in the case of natural products. While plants are growing, they need the entire spectrum of sunlight to live. Once the plants are picked, however, visible light waves become very damaging. Not only do they cause the plant to lose its precious properties, starting with aroma and ending with its therapeutic effects, but they may even lead to total degradation. At the same time, certain infrared and ultraviolet wavelengths sustain the vitality of plants after they are picked. Those waves have a similar effect on naturally sourced products.

The mechanism behind this process is not completely clear yet, but it is undoubtedly an expression of the relationship between living cells and light emission and absorption, a phenomena examined by a fast-developing science called biophotonics. Thus, violet glass (which is so dark that it looks almost black) is called biophotonic glass.

Beauty skin care "WITHOUT"

Whether a cosmetic is natural or not is determined not only by the natural products used in its production, but also – equally importantly – by the complete elimination of forbidden (usually synthetic) ingredients from its formula. Many cosmetics companies list plant ingredients in big letters on the packaging, as if this were enough to recognise that the cosmetic is natural. Meanwhile, according to the standards of natural cosmetic certification bodies, many substances need to be absolutely eliminated from natural cosmetics, substances commonly used by manufacturers of conventional cosmetics and permitted by the law.

It is already known that these substances could be harmful, either for humans or for the environment: they can provoke allergies, accumulate in the body, stress the kidneys or liver, support the development of tumours or pollute the environment, harming other organisms living on Earth. For the sake of safety, certification bodies do not permit the use of substances whose effects on the human body have not been sufficiently investigated. D’Alchemy does not use any ingredients forbidden by certification bodies in its production processes. In particular, d’Alchemy cosmetics do not contain:

1. Formaldehyde/formalin
2. Synthetic preservatives, except for nature-identical substances
3. Parabens
4. Lanolin
5. Paraffin
6. Silicones/Silicone oils
7. SLS or SLES
8. PEG / PPG
9. Artificial aromas
10. Artificial colouring agents
11. Any substances in the form of nanoparticles