Pangea Organics Pyrenees Lavender with Cardamom Hand & Body Lotion
Photo from Amazon.com
(Part of my Green This House program.)
I picked up Pangea Organics’ Pyrenees Lavender with Cardamom Hand & Body Lotion a while ago to quell the complaints of my thirsty winter skin. (I never got around to whipping up my own.) Although somewhat pricey at $15.99 for 8 oz.—compared with, say $5.99 for 18 oz. of something in its class by St. Ives—the moisturizer gets a low hazard score of 0.3 by the Environmental Working Group, while St. Ives’ range of bath and body products get hazard scores ranging from a moderate 1.6 to a danger-danger-Will-Robinson 4.1, likely because of potentially cancer-causing parabens and other chemicals I have trouble pronouncing. (Pangea says it never uses petrochemicals, synthetic ingredients, sulfates, detergents, dyes, or artificial fragrances in its products.)
The calming lavender scent is pleasing without being cloying; the spicy upper notes of cardamom—a scent chai-lovers will instantly recognize—though sharp, never veer into becoming pungent. Made with mostly organic ingredients, the lotion doesn’t dry as sticky as Farmaesthetics’ Nourishing Lavender Milk ($25 for 8 oz.) does, but it’s also not as emollient, which means ultradry skin may prefer to go with Farmasethetics’ lotion.
Pangea rather vaguely states it is “cruelty-free,” but doesn’t carry the little leaping-bunny logo on its products, so it’s hard to tell what it’s animal-testing policies are. I e-mailed the company and was told that it doesn’t test on animals, but frequently tests on its own (human) staff, instead. I’d still like to see the leaping bunny make an appearance, however, to remove any lingering edge of doubt from that nondescript phrase.
An eco-friendly piece of trivia: According to the company’s Web site, Pangea’s bodycare products, once applied, start biodegrading in 48 hours, while other conventional products that contain chemical-foaming agents can take closer to 200 years to break down. That’s just not cool.
Summer said,
March 12, 2007 at 8:31 pm
I visited there booth at the Natural Products Expo last weekend, and met the Founder Josh Onysko. Nice guy. This was the only booth I visited that wasn’t giving away samples…. the sales woman said it was because they didn’t have smaller packaging that was earth friendly. I thought that was pretty cool, and very rare at a trade show (they can be soo wasteful).
d. said,
March 16, 2007 at 11:44 am
this is a relatively new company which started with soap in cool packaging & have expanded to lotion, facial care, etc…they probably just don’t have the funds to get the little bunny (i could be wrong, but i’m sure there’s a fee involved…as most things in life do not come free. even little bunnies).
looking at the ingredients on the lotion you mentioned, none of these would need to be tested on animals anyway–most of these ingredients are used by natural skincare companies like aubrey organics (which not only doesn’t test on animals, but doesn’t use ingredients that have been tested on animals)…so there’s no need for pangea to get into that. that’s how i see it anyway…but i could be wrong :)
i’m really enjoying your blog…so glad i stumbled onto it!
peace.
d.
green LA girl » Good green lotions said,
March 20, 2007 at 11:37 pm
[...] Pangea Organics Hand & Body Lotion. $5.99 for a 18-oz bottle. Jasmin of The Worsted Witch notes that the lotion gets a nice, low 0.3 rating from EWG. Of the Pyrenees Lavender with Cardamom scent, Jasmin says “The calming lavender scent is pleasing without being cloying; the spicy upper notes of cardamom—a scent chai-lovers will instantly recognize—though sharp, never veer into becoming pungent.” [...]
joshua said,
March 26, 2007 at 3:05 pm
Hi,
thanks for all the nice comments, its heard to get a lotion to be as emollient as people are use to, this is mainly because the thickness is coming from petroleum based ingredients, but you will find with a few weeks of use, that the lipids in the lotion will start curing your dry skin instead of just covering up the issue, as far the leaping bunny, we had it at one point but in the end there is no symbol that really checks companies out…..but you all should know, I’m a vegetarian and I personally check all the sources of all of our ingredients, people would be quite upset to find out what is tested on our little friends (like POM)……..joshua