Today we’re creating a beautiful summery Strawberry Rose Toning Facial Mist—a fruity floral hydrating skin treat designed to soothe and moisturize your skin. I’m really enjoying it towards the end of my skin care routine and throughout the day for an added boost of topical hydration (and possibly a sudden craving for a smoothie).
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The bulk of this facial toning mist is watery things. I’d say the strawberry and rose hydrosols are our stars—they combine to create a decadent, fruity-floral scent that is positively addicting. Misting it around my face never fails to make me think of summery cocktails and all things sunshine. Some witch hazel distillate adds some refreshing astringency to the mix without the sorta funky scent coming through.
For fancy things; we’ve got a touch of calendula extract for its soothing properties, and both sodium lactate and propanediol for some great hydration without stickiness. Some panthenol (vitamin B5) further boosts the moisturizing and soothing properties of the mist.
Everything comes together without any heat, so this one is crazy easy to make. Measure, mix, and we’re done! Package this lovely fragrant solution in a mister bottle and you’re ready to spritz away to your heart’s content. Enjoy!
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Strawberry Rose Toning Facial Mist
19.5g | 39% distilled water
7.5g | 15% strawberry hydrosol
12.5g | 25% rose hydrosol
7.5g | 15% witch hazel
1g | 2% calendula extract
0.5g | 1% sodium lactate (USA / Canada)
0.5g | 1% Propanediol 1,3 (USA / Canada)
0.75g | 1.5% panthenol powder (vitamin B5) (USA / Canada)
0.25g | 0.5% Liquid Germall Plus™ (USA / Canada)Weigh all the ingredients into a small beaker. Stir to combine. Transfer to a 50mL (1.69fl oz) bottle with a mister top and you’re done!
Alternatively, you could just weigh everything directly into the bottle, cap, and shake to combine.
To use, mist over your face and enjoy the hydrating, refreshing goodness.
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.
- To learn more about the ingredients used in this recipe, including why they’re included and what you can substitute them with, please visit the Humblebee & Me Encyclopedia. It doesn’t have everything in it yet, but there’s lots of good information there! If I have not given a specific substitution suggestion in this list please look up the ingredient in the encyclopedia before asking.
- Instead of the specified hydrosols you can use a different hydrosol/hydrosol blend or more distilled water; this will obviously impact the scent of the final product.
- You can replace the witch hazel with more distilled water or aloe vera juice
- You can use a different botanical extract instead of calendula.
- You can use a different humectant instead of sodium lactate/propanediol. You can try vegetable glycerin, though you may find it to be a bit sticky. I would recommend using all of either sodium lactate or propanediol if you can. Sodium PCA would also be a good choice.
- Read the encyclopedia entry for panthenol for substitution suggestions.
- If you’re like to use a different preservative, please review this page.
Gifting Disclosure
The rose hydrosol and strawberry hydrosol were gifted by Essential Wholesale.
Hi Marie,
I have found propanediol on ND Australia, is this the same as propanediol 1,3? Thank you,
Yes! You can learn more about the 1,3 vs 1,2 on LabMuffin 🙂 Happy making!
Hi Marie!
Can you add ceramides to this as well?
Love your website and your book!
I can’t see why not—it would be lovely! You can follow the instructions here for that. Happy making 🙂
Thank you!
Ratios are perfect for my taste. Great for both body and face.
I made 3 different options (rose, pineapple, mint) and used 100 grams as a 7skinmetdod toner. Mint, sage, 2 % willowbark + burdock root, mpg was my favourite, suprisingly, but rosey one is also lovely 😛
I’ve so thrilled you’re enjoying playing with this formulation! 😀 I love your variations—thanks for DIYing with me, and happy making 🙂
Btw, I used synthetic mono propylene glycol instead of propanediol. Thanks for the link!
was wondering if there’s danger in liquid germall plus in spray forms, as the lotioncrafter product site says not to be used in aerosols?
Not as far as I’ve been able to find (sprays and aerosols aren’t the same), but you could try a different preservative if you want to 🙂
Hi, Marie! Is it okay to add pink mica in this mist recipe? how can it stay suspended in the mix?
I don’t recommend it; mica will 1) clog the sprayer, 2) settle out, and 3) if you thicken the mixture enough to keep mica suspended it’ll be too thick to mist 🙂
Hi Marie.
I love the idea of this. I can’t get sodium lactate or propanediol though sadly.
I know you said veg glycerin could be too sticky. Could I use a mix of glycerin and Propylene Glycol instead do you think?
Thank you
That will likely work, but I do find opinions/perceptions on “tackiness” to be very personal. If you have a high tack tolerance you will likely be ok with more glycerin. You could also use propylene glycol to replace both of the original humectants 🙂 Happy making!
Thank you for taking the time to reply . I’ll get making
Hi Marie!
I made this over the last couple of days. LOVE it! When I first made it, the liquid is yellowish in colour but morphed to a pink hue by the following day.
I didn’t sub anything. Any idea why? My rose hydrosol is from NDA, strawberry essence is from Lotioncrafter.
Thanks!
Hmm. With a colour change that fast, I wouldn’t expect any kind of microbial action to be behind it. Weirdly enough, this is the second time in two days I’ve heard about a product using an NDA hydrosol colour shifting (read the comments from Camille here). I’m trying to brainstorm variables, and the first thing that comes to mind is the preservatives used in the different hydrosols—perhaps those conflicted/reacted in some way? I’d probably make two batches, one with 100% rose hydrosol and one with 100% strawberry (so 40% hydrosol for each batch, but just one hydrosol rather than a blend) and see if the same thing happens. Happy experimenting!