My Australia countdown is in full swing (I leave in three weeks!), so even though it’s definitely still winter here I’ve got images of sandy beaches and steamy rainforests dancing around in my head pretty much all the time. Talking with my friends down there has me somewhat concerned I may melt. I love hot weather more than most people (more than most Canadians, at least)—I don’t know many people who are stoked about 35°C, but I am. 45°C, on the other hand… that may be a bit much. We’ll see. In preparation, though, I’ve created this cooling, Australian-inspired body mist.
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I figured I’d keep the mist fairly simple, resisting the temptation to add every skin-loving ingredient I own. The majority of the mist is water, with a portion of that being peppermint hydrosol. If you don’t have peppermint hydrosol you can use more water in its place and add 6–10 drops of peppermint essential oil to make up its minty goodness.
Hydrolyzed silk and panthenol (vitamin B5) help with skin hydration and soothing (brilliant in the event of sunburn). Some water soluble shea butter or Olivem300 bring some skin-softening lipid loveliness to the mix and do double duty as a solubilizer for the Eucalyptus Radiata essential oil. Handy!
Since everything is liquid we don’t have to melt anything, meaning we can just mix everything together and call it a day. Easy peasy! Mist away, my lovelies.
Want to watch this project instead of read it?
Eucalyptus Mint Body Mist
34.75g | 69.50% distilled water
10g | 20% peppermint hydrosol
1g | 2% hydrolyzed silk (USA / Canada) (wondering about substitutions?)
1g | 2% panthenol powder (vitamin B5) (USA / Canada)
2.5g | 5% water soluble shea butter or Olivem 300 (USA / Canada)
0.5g | 12 drops | 1% eucalyptus radiata essential oil
0.25g | 0.50% Liquid Germall Plus™ (USA / Canada) (or other broad spectrum preservative of choice at recommended usage rate [why?])Weigh all of the ingredients into a small heat-resistant glass measuring cup. Stir, whisk, or blend to combine thoroughly. I used the MICROMini™ Mixer from Lotion Crafter, which is quite a lovely gadget. It’s a Badger Air-Brush Co. Paint Mixer, which you can also get on Canadian Amazon. It’s smaller than the Minipro Mixer, and well suited to less viscous projects like this one.
Once everything is all blended up, decant the mist into a 50mL mister bottle (2fl oz will also work). That’s it!
Shelf Life & Storage
Because this body mist contains water, you must include a broad-spectrum preservative to ward off microbial growth. This is non-optional. Even with a preservative this project is likely to eventually spoil as our kitchens are not sterile laboratories, so in the event you notice any change in colour, scent, or texture, chuck it out and make a fresh batch.
Substitutions
As always, be aware that making substitutions will change the final product. While these swaps won’t break the recipe, you will get a different final product than I did.
- As I’ve provided this recipe in percentages as well as grams you can easily calculate it to any size using a simple spreadsheet as I’ve explained in this post. As written in grams this recipe will make 50g.
- If you don’t have peppermint hydrosol, you can use more distilled water and add 6–10 drops of peppermint essential oil along with the eucalyptus essential oil
- You can use a different hyrdolyzed protein instead of the hydrolyzed silk; try oat or wheat.
- If you don’t have panthenol you can try vegetable glycerin in its place. This isn’t a brilliant substitution as all it really does is replace the humectant properties of the panthenol, but glycerin is a pretty easy-to-get ingredient.
- You can use Olivem300 instead of the water soluble shea butter—NOT Olivem1000, that is solid.
- You can use eucalyptus globulus essential oil instead of radiata. I haven’t tried all the different varieties of eucalyptus; I suspect many of them would work well, but I would avoid the lemon version as it smells strongly of bug spray.
You and Belinda are killing me with your fancy schmancy ingredients!!! Water soluble shea butter. I shall try this stuff next year when I am moved! The Soap Kitchen has it!
I am actually doing a unit on solublizers and I decided to give Olivem 300 a test. And so far, if I leave the concoctions alone, they all separate within a few days. How neat is that! I’m trying to build up the courage to do a Ploysorbate 20 test, but I’m afraid of these results! I know. Nothing really to do with this post, thought it was interesting!
Ooooh, that is really interesting! Hmmmmmm. I look forward to reading about your results 🙂
You know I love teasing you with my fancy smancy ingredients! You could always move to the US, you know…… Oh well, our loss is Europe’s gain.
That is interesting about the Olivem 300. I’ve noticed the same thing when I’ve used it in a toner. That’s one of the reasons I switched to water soluble shea. No separation in my toners. I use the Olivem 300 in shampoos I make but the surfactants take care of any emulsion issues.
I’ve found that, too! I mention Olivem300 as an alternative to WS shea but the WS shea is truly the better option—I left it for a week without any separation issues!
Woo hoo! W/S Shea for the win!
DIY party time—woo!
Hi,
I was wondering if this would make an appropriate facial mist if Lavender or rose hydrosol was used?
Thank you for all your recipes!
Yup! Happy making 😀
Hi Marie, I’m just in the middle of making it when I realized that you are using a powder panthenol and mine is in a liquid form…is that ok? thank you again for an amazing recipe, my sister is leaving for Bali pretty much the same time you are going to Australia and she is also a extreme heat lover and thought this would be something awesome to bring with her on her trip!
Liquid is 100% ok, it’s just sensitive to heat, so make sure you are putting it in your cool down phase for things that are heated 🙂 Enjoy! I hope your sister loves Bali!
Excited that you’re coming Down Under, Marie. It has been a bit like living in a sauna lately in Melbourne!
Oh my goodness, I couldn’t be more excited! We FINALLY booked a bunch of stuff today and I now have three meetups scheduled on Facebook in Sydney, Hobart, and Melbourne. I can’t wait… even moreso because we’ve got a high of -19°C for Wednesday, blech 😛
You will love Australia – it’s very hot at the moment on the east coast (ie. Melbourne, Sydney). If you have time, try and visit Queensland, it’s amazing (and the hottest and very tropical, but sooo beautiful). I live in Perth and our weather is quite mild at the moment, only reaching about 32 degrees (celsius) – I’m dying for 40 degree days so I can hang at the beach all day – ha ha xxx
Ahhhhh I can’t wait! I haven’t been back since I lived there in 2010 and I cannot wait to soak up all that lovely warmth and wonderfulness. In two weeks I’ll be impatiently waiting for my plane to land 😀
Hi
Love going through your recipes and videos. I have a question regarding substitution.
I don’t have WS Shea. Can I use PS80? If yes, then what percentage?
I wouldn’t recommend it; PS80 is quite sticky and that’s not desirable for a leave-on product.
Oh my gosh the silk peptide was so foul smelling!! It ruined my batch. Is that normally stinky? I think I’ll be leaving it out next time.
They typically have a bit of a smell, but none of the silk I’ve ever used is downright putrid. You might prefer a different hydrolyzed protein, like oat or rice 🙂
Thank you so much for all of your tutorials and ideas for substitutions, your blog has been a great inspiration to me.
I would like to make a body spray that is clear but uses a fragrance oil vs. an essential oil AND I would like for it to be clear or not cloudy. The ingredients in this blend look wonderful. How would this do with a fragrance oil? I don’t want to shake before use. Thank you for your response.
Hey! So, depending on how open you are to silicones, you might just try adding your FO/essential oil blend to some cyclomethicone or cyclopentasiloxane. You won’t need a preservative, it won’t be cloudy because it isn’t an emulsion, and it’ll have great skin feel. My experience with getting non-cloudy emulsions/solubilized solutions is generally that you need a lot of solubilizer, which can negatively impact the skin feel. Lotion Crafter has a couple of sample formulas using cyclomethicone as the base for room/body sprays 🙂 Happy making!
Hello, me name is Susan. I am loving diy and make many, many of your brilliant recipes. I also bought your book, and love it.
I was wondering, everyone at my work is loving the hydrating body mist that I made. I use it more as a body spray during the day to smell delicious. People would like to buy it. Could I just use distilled water, polysorbate and the fragrance oil that smells so yummy? Would this recipe be best just for a body spray or should I incorporate some panthenol and silk amino acids?
Thank you for your advice. Would you help me to price the different sprays? The glass mister for 60ml is $1.47. I really appreciate your time to consider this. Thank you, Susan.
I’m afraid I can’t offer advice on selling things, but you will definitely need a preservative for that product. I shared this post on some things to consider before selling that you might find useful 🙂 Happy making!
Hi,
I have silk amino acids pf liquid and as I’ve been reading I am having trouble deciding if I can use this ingredient in place of the hydrolyzed silk powder.