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Lab Note: My “Dusty” Escin Eye Cream Experiment
Hello Hello! 😀 Today I’m looking back at a formula that required a very steady hand and a bit of patience. I wanted to create a treatment specifically for the delicate eye area, focusing on puffiness and those tired mornings. yeheee!
The star of this experiment was Escin (the active from Horse Chestnut). If you’ve worked with it, you know it’s a very fine, “dusty” powder that can be a bit of a diva to incorporate. But it’s so worth it for its ability to support microcirculation! I also included Caffeine to give the skin a little “wake-up call.”
The Formula I Used:
Phase A:
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Distilled Water: to 100
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Glycerin: 2.0
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Caffeine: 0.5 (I dissolved this in the hot water phase)
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Xanthan Gum: 0.2
Phase B (The Light Lipid Phase):
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Methyl Glucose Sesquistearate: 3.0 (My reliable emulsifier)
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Cetyl Alcohol: 1.0 (Just a little for stability)
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Argan Oil: 3.0 (Rich in Vitamin E but not too heavy)
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Rice Bran Oil: 2.0
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Shea Butter: 0.5 (Just a tiny touch for creaminess)
Phase C (The Active Cold Phase):
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Escin: 1.0 (The “dusty” hero!)
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Cornflower Water (Hydrolat): 10.0 (Soothing for the eyes)
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D-Panthenol: 1.0
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Tocopherol (Vitamin E): 0.5
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Preservative: (According to my usual lab choice)
Notes from my Beaker:
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The Caffeine Trick: I made sure to add the Caffeine to Phase A while the water was hot. It dissolves much better that way, so you don’t end up with any “crunchy” bits in your eye cream!
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Handling the Escin: This was the trickiest part. Escin is very light and dusty. I found that pre-mixing it with the Cornflower Water in Phase C to create a smooth slurry made it much easier to fold into the emulsion without it flying everywhere!
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The Texture: Because it’s for the eyes, I wanted it to be light. The combination of Argan and Rice Bran oil makes it sink in quickly so it doesn’t mess up my concealer later.
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pH is Critical: For the eye area, I was extremely careful to check the pH. I kept it right at 6.0 to 6.5. Our eyes are much more sensitive to acidity than the rest of our face, so “neutral” is the way to go here.
Final Verdict: I’ve been using this in the mornings, and I really notice a difference in how “awake” my eyes look. The Escin and Caffeine duo is like a double espresso for the face! It’s a bit of a “picky” formula to make, but the results are so elegant. ENJOY! 😀
IT'S ALL IN MY HANDS 
very interested in your solution to ‘black’ dark circles please! I feel like I’ve had them since I was born and no matter what I do they don’t go away 😦
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Hello San! 🙂
I will try something!
Don’t be sad! 🙂 As I said above, your dark circles have been proven to not let the area wrinkle very easily 😉
The thing is that the cells of that area, to protect your eyes, produce a lot of melanin.
The main thing to do to try to avoid these dark circles from getting even darker is to protect your eyes from UVA and UVB. You could use very good and dark sunglasses when exposed to the sun!
I am not a too big fan of sunscreen creams, but if you know you are going to be in the sun for many hours… then think about getting a good sunscreen for your eye-area.
This won’t solve the problem but it will prevent it from getting worse 🙂
Anyway really don’t worry: there are many ingredients which have depigmentation properties! Mostly what they do is they stop the production of melanin (in one way or another). I will try to make a good formulation (specially considering the delicate eye-area).
Will come back soon enough! 🙂
Don’t be sad!! 🙂
– C
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where do you get the ingredients from??
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Hello Julie!
I made a post about where to purchase cosmetic ingredients online!
There are many websites and I didn’t even name half of them.
Check the post: “buying cosmetic ingredients online”
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Hi, you give me a hope. Thanks for bloggibg. I want to make anticelulite body milk and want to know the best procentage fot it and do you put coffeine direct as a powder in A.
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Caffeine isn’t very soluble. I think 1% is already a good amount. For an anticellulite body lotion you can add also other ingredients that help with blood circulation (menthol, mentyl lactate – these give a cold effect that… Otherwise for the warm effect you could add 0.5% of essential oils like eucalypt/rosemary which tend to give the opposite effect). There are also many other anticellulite ingredients available now 🙂
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Thanks so much for your wonderful posts IAIMH!
I was wondering what purity of aescin you used for this formulation. I only have access to 10% and 20% powders of aescin, do you think that it’s appropriate for this use?
xoxo
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Hi Bee,
Mine was pure and very very hard to work with.
Yours might work too, just make sure the other ingredients are fine for around the eyes (I don’t know what’s the 80% or 90%)… Or you could simply leave this ingredient out of the formula and adjust the water.
🙂
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I’m actually thinking of making this a serum instead of a cream, will probably have to tweak it quite a bit. Will definitely let you know how it goes if I manage it successfully.
I appreciate you IAIMH!
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