Review: Neal's Yard Remedies Rose Facial Oil + the NYR Rose Absolute Provenance Story

 Neal's Yard Remedies Rose Facial Oil (50ml, £21.50, link)*

It's no secret that I'm a huge fan of beauty products that contain rose, especially when it comes to skincare.  Roses are my all time favourite flowers and their scent is just so feminine and classic, what's not to love?  So when Neal's Yard Remedies got in touch with me to ask if I'd like to learn more about where the rose absolute essential oil that they use in their products comes from, I was certainly intrigued to find out where this beautiful flower is grown and how it is harvested.    

 

Susan Curtis, Medicines Director at Neal’s Yard Remedies**, went to visit the wonderful farming coorperatives in the Isparta province of Southern Turkey, who produce the richly fragrant rose absolute for NYR.  The rose harvesting begins each morning before dawn, and finishes when the heat of the day begins to warm the flowers, evaporating the night’s dew and releasing the precious scent enclosed within the petals.

As the roses are picked early in the day, the pickers can enjoy a fresh lunch together in the early afternoon.

Roses are picked for about 5 weeks in May/early June and they are all hand picked to avoid any damage.  Each petal is incredibly precious – if even one is dropped, it’s picked up and put back in the bag.  None are left behind.  Once picked, the roses are transported a short distance to the processing unit.  Each truck can hold an amazing two tonnes of roses!

  At the processing unit, all the roses are emptied onto the floor of a cool room within a few hours of picking. They must be kept cool so that they don’t begin fermenting in the sack.  There are enough rose petals to cover the floor for two big rooms!   While they are waiting to be processed, the rose petals are constantly turned to keep them cool as seen above.  The roses are packed into large caldrons to be processed.  This takes about two hours to produce a beautiful thick, red, fragranced substance called rose concrete which is used in many Neal's Yard Remedies products, including our Rose Facial Oil.

  

It takes around 700kg of roses to make 1kg of absolute.  Neal's Yard Remedies uses around 70kg of absolute or 50 tonnes of roses every year in their products.

Neal's Yard Remedies Rose Facial Oil is one of the end products that the damask rose absolute is put into.  It's a thick, yellow coloured oil which helps to restore radiance and nourish normal skin, plus it aims to smooth the appearance of fine lines if you have mature skin too.  I like using facial oils instead of heavy night creams sometimes, especially when the weather starts to get colder like it has done recently.

To use, I just apply a few drops of the oil onto a cotton wool round and gently pat into my skin after I have cleansed and toned.  It doesn't have a dropper application which I would have preferred, so if you want to use it directly in your palms/hands instead of on a cotton wool round, make sure that you tip it slowly! 

I can't comment on the 'smoothing of lines' claims as I'm lucky to only have them under my eyes at the moment (here's hoping that it stays that way for a few years to come!), but I can say that it made my skin feel soft, look brighter, and it felt nicely hydrated when I got up in the morning.

I probaly wouldn't recommend this for very oily skintypes because I think it would be too heavy, even if you used a small amount, but this is definitely great for those with dry-to very dry and normal skintypes.  As I have oily/combination skin, I don't use it every night, and instead save it as a weekly facial treat for which it works really well for me.

Are you a fan of rose being used in beauty products?  

Do you like to know where ingredients in products that you use come from?

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*PR sample

**Rose provenance photos & commentary by Neal's Yard Remedies