Adding color to natural products can enhance their appearance, and the user’s overall perception of the experience. While there are several ingredients available to color or dye skin care products, none are as unquestionably natural as Tinting Herbs. Many plants release natural pigment when they are infused into oil or water. These infusions can be added to the oil or water portions of your formulas, yielding a range of lovely earth toned colors.
To create an infusion, simply warm your water or oil, place herbs into the liquid, and steep for 20 – 40 minutes. After the infusion has taken place, the herbs must be strained from the liquid. You can use a Cheese Cloth or a Fine Mesh Strainer to strain the plant material from the liquid. Alternatively, you can avoid the mess by placing the herbs into a Large Tea Bag or a Large Mesh Tea Ball. The colored oil or water can be added drop by drop to your formulas or it can be substituted for a portion of the water or oil called for in a recipe.
Experimentation is the best way to find your favorite shades of color. While these herbs are likely to repeat a shade in different formulas, they may react differently in unique oils or liquids. To give you some ideas, I’ve listed a few of the most popular Tinting Herbs with the colors they are most likely to produce:
Alkanet Root Powder – Dark Red to Purple
Annatto Seed – Orange
Henna Leaf Powder – Orange
Paprika Powder – Orange
Parsley Powder – Green
Red Sandalwood Powder – Maroon to Purple
Turmeric Powder – Yellow
I haven’t tried it yet, but I’ve heard henna does a wonderful job in hair color. I was curious if the Alkanet was just as good, since I prefer a deep red.
Have you heard or know of any or colored your own hair with henna or any other tinting herb(s)?
I really would like to stop using the usual chemical treatment and do something better for my hair.
What oil would you infuse if making a lip balm? I’m having trouble dissolving my beet root powder.
You can infuse almost any Carrier Oil for use in a lip balm but my favorites for making oil infusions is Coconut Oil. Both Coconut (76 Degree) and Fractionated Coconut Oil make excellent infusions for both scented and colored herbs. If you aren’t happy with the results you are seeing from Beet Root Powder I would suggest experimenting with Alkanet. Some formulators prefer Alkanet over Beet Powder for color and ease of use.
Can you use the ingredients in soy wax?
We haven’t experimented with adding herbs to soy wax for color. One thing to keep in mind is that the herb powders are solids and won’t dissolve in to the melted wax. I found a couple of links that might help. http://www.soap-blog.com/2010/05/natural-candles-coloring-your-candles.html / http://candleandsoap.about.com/od/tipsandtechniques/a/naturalsoycolor.htm
How does one mix bees way with oil to create a cream? I am in possession os a heavy soap like bees wax. Oil in the wax seperates from the wax similar to the seperation of oil and water. Do I use an emulsifier?
It sounds like the first thing you’ll want to do is verify that what you have is pure Beeswax. If the ingredient is blended with something other than Beeswax that might explain why it is behaving so strangely. Generally Beeswax and Oil melt together very easily with no emulsifier. I can’t think of any reason why that might happen with pure Beeswax. Is it possible for you to contact the manufacturer or supplier of this wax for more information about it?
Hi I just got finished making a batch of home made exfoliating bath melts. I mixed my cranberry powder in with my sweet almond carrier oil per usual and it turned out that I had to much for the batch I was making. Is it safe to bottle up the left over veggie powder and almond oil mixture and save it for another time?
Hi Maggie. If the powder is completely dry, stable, and free of moisture it is probably OK to store it blended with the oil. Just be sure to use it up quickly and to label it appropriately so that you know what it is!
How can I use these powders to color body butter? How would I mix t in the carrier oil? Do I warm the carrier oil?
Hi Ara. The best way to add these kinds of colors to body butter is to infuse the oil in your recipe with the herbs. Warm the oils with the herbs (about 2 tbsp of herbs for every cup of oil) in a double boiler for about 20 minutes, then allow it to cool to room temperature. Strain the oil through a very fine mesh (like a nut milk bag or cheesecloth) then go ahead and use the oils as you normally would in your recipe.
I saw another post of yours that stated that Oat Straw Powder can also give a green color after infusing? Is that still correct? Thanks!
Hello Darlene, Yes, previous testing done provided a green hue when the Oat Straw Powder was infused with oil.