Aloe Vera
WONDER OF NATURE
Imagine you are walking through the desert and you realize that there is a hole in your water bottle. What would you do? Fix it as fast as possible of course. Now imagine you are a plant that carries its water in its leaves, and one of your leaves has a hole in it. What would you do? If your answer is the same as before, great, you now know how the Aloe Vera plant “thinks”.
Aloe Vera is world famous for its moisturising, regenerating and healing effects. It simply comes from its defense mechanism of living in such a harsh environment, where it needs to store water and protect it. Aloe Vera has being used for its healing and regenerating purposes throughout time from the early Egyptians to modern times. It is truly the perfect plant for keeping your skin hydrated, healthy, and smooth, it helps diminish wrinkles and fine lines making your skin look young and fresh. On this page we will list some of the benefits and what to look out for when shopping for Aloe Vera, because most Aloe Vera products are not made with inner leaf gel but from an extract.
Aloe Vera's great healing power explained
Aloe Vera contains 75 potentially active components, including Minerals, Amino Acids and Vitamins. They work together in synergy to provide protection from the harsh environment the plant grows in. The single components can't do it by themself, but Aloe Vera has over time perfected this powerful synergetic mix, which works as a powerful anti-inflammatory remedy that helps speed up the healing of wounds, burns, and stings. It is the perfect remedy for both healing and protecting your skin or as a natural aftersun lotion.
Your All-Purpose Beauty Product
Aloe Vera is everybody's friend in everyday life: Mature skins, baby skins, normal or oily skins, sunburns, bites, wounds, etc. It will immediately soothe and comfort you as soon as it touches your skin... Besides being one of the best cosmetic products for the skin, it also helps treat and protect your hair, nails, heels, and everything else you feel deserves it. We always recommend you to have a bottle of Aloe Vera nearby, it's your natural liquid talisman...
Nutrient rich soil =
Nutrient rich plants
Throughout history, humans have settled around volcanos because of their nutrients rich soil, and today people use volcanic ash to fertilize their crops. Fuerteventura is a volcanic island in the Atlantic Ocean and has ideal conditions for growing Aloe Vera with its nutrients rich volcanic soil and little rainfall. That is why we only use local ecological Aloe Vera (Grown organic and friendly to the local ecosystem).
Aloe Vera contains 20 essential minerals
So how do they help us? Here are some.
Calcium: Helps replace old and dead skin cells with new ones and gives your skin a natural glow. It also protects your skin from harsh and dry weather conditions and assists in fighting of acne.
Iron: Helps your immune system fight infections and your blood speed up the healing process of wounds. Iron deficiency can lead to hair loss.
Zinc: Helps heal and rejuvenate your skin by improving your immunological processes. Together with copper helps regenerate the skin's elastic fiber network which reduces wrinkles.
Copper: Helps with synthesis and stabilization of skin proteins.
Magnesium: Helps support the synthesis of collagen which helps fight wrinkles. It also has anti-inflammatory properties and helps rehydrate damaged and dry skin.
Selenium: It helps protects your skin from UV radiation and free radicals which could damage your skin. It also plays a vital role in repairing your DNA which helps slow down the signs of aging.
And what about the Vitamins
Aloe Vera is a natural source of these vitamins: A, B1, B2, B6, B9, C, and E.
A (beta-carotene): This is an antioxidant that helps protect the skin cells against UV light and pollution. Studies also show it can be transformed into retinol which has an anti-aging effect.
B1 (Thiamine) and B2 (Riboflavin): Both help with wound healing. B2 also helps maintain the structure of the skin.
B6 (Pyridoxine): It helps reduce dandruff by keeping your scalp healthy.
B9 (Folic acid): Helps with the growth of collagen which helps improve the skin's elasticity making it look younger and helps fight cellulite.
C: A powerful antioxidant that helps stimulates collagen and elastin production. It helps fade out dark spots giving you bright and glowing skin.
E: This is an oil-soluble antioxidant that helps protect the skin from sun and UV light by preserving the fat and moisture in the skin.
Fresh Aloe Vera is simply superior
Our ecological Aloe Vera is harvested just before use and we only use the pure natural gel from the middle of the leaf. Most other brands use extract or freeze-dried Aloe Vera from China or Mexico which they then mix with water. Just like making orange juice from concentrate. It just loses its natural goodness.
Is 100% gel better than 98% Aloe Vera?
We use 98% pure ecological Aloe Vera gel in our Aloe Vera gel. Many companies write Aloe Vera 100% Gel or Aloe Vera 100% Natural. This is not an indication of its Aloe Vera content, just that it is 100% gel or 100% natural. Most of those brands are water-based with a fraction of Aloe Vera extract. Always read the ingredients list. If the first ingredient is water, then that is what you are getting.
How to avoid being tricked?
Always read the ingredients list
By law, companies have to write the list of ingredients in order of weight (Unless it's less than 1% of the total weight). So if the first ingredient is water, then that is what you get, maybe with a bit of Aloe Vera extract. If the company on their webpage does not clearly indicate an ingredients list as it would be on their bottle, then there is something wrong.
Building blocks from Aloe Vera
Aloe Vera contains 19 types of Amino Acids, here are some of them and there benefits for your skin.
Arginine: Helps protect your skin from free radicals that could damage your skin's cell membrane and collagen. It also helps attract moisture from the air to hydrate your skin.
Glycine, Proline, and Hydroxyproline: Are the 3 main amino acids in collagen synthesis, which helps reduce wrinkles and fine lines in your skin.
Histidine: Helps soothe your skin and heal burns and wounds, it is also used to help you relieve pain and itchiness.
Leucine: Helps you with wound healing and to prevent hair loss.
Lysine: Helps bind your skin together and speed up wound healing. It helps with your uptake of iron which helps prevent hair loss and it helps your scalp stay healthy which reduces dandruff.
Phenylalanine: Helps protect the skin from sun exposure, it is also used in the treatment of vitiligo a skin pigmentation disorder.
What else is there in Aloe Vera?
Aloe Vera contains 75 active components, here is a short list of some of them that have not been mentioned so far.
Acemannan: This is a bioactive polysaccharide (carbohydrate) known to have anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory properties. It also helps you with wound healing and boosts your immune system.
Cholesterol, campesterol, β-sitosterol, and lupeol: Are 4 types of plant steroids, all known for their anti-inflammatory actions.
Lophenol and Cycloartanol: 2 type of plant sterols, that helps increase the production of collagen and hyaluronic acid which help diminish wrinkles and fine lines.
Salicylic acid (Same as in Aspirin): Great exfoliating properties, help treat acne, Vulgaris, melasma, photodamage, freckles, and lentigines.
Tannic acid: Has shown antibacterial, antimicrobial, and antiviral properties which help protect your skin and also help speed up wound healing.
Gibberellins and Auxins: Plant hormones that have an anti-inflammatory and healing effect on your skin.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Aloe Vera is truly a magnificent plant when it comes to protecting your skin and keeping it healthy and youthful.
The abundance of components from minerals and vitamins to enzymes and sugars all play an active role in synergy to protect the plant, and it is this synergy that makes Aloe Vera so powerful. Not many studies have been made regarding the synergy of all these different components, more about the individual components which have been widely studied and are now being made synthetic to be used in creams and lotions. How come we tried to create all the individual components when we still don’t fully understand the larger role of the synergy and we actually have a plant that has perfected this for millenniums.
To get the true benefits of Aloe Vera, it needs to be preserved gently. We only use the inner gel from the leaf, which we treat with lemon juice, simply to prevent it from going bad in a few days. That is the base for our products, lotions, creams and soaps. The 98% Aloe Vera gel we offer is only mixed with natural ingredients to keep the Aloe Vera fresh and ready for you to apply to your skin.
If you have tried Aloe Vera before and was not convinced about its great properties, it might be because the product you were using didn’t contain the pure inner leaf gel. Aloe Vera has lost some of its reputation, due to the fact that many brands only use powdered Aloe Vera (extract or freeze-dried), in many of these cases the entire leaf is used and blended and then processed, meaning it looses many of its properties.
As mentioned before: read the label. But that is not always enough since companies now have started to write the mix (Water + Aloe Vera) as one ingredient Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Juice. So how to tell? First, think of where it is made. If it is made anywhere that has frost then they won’t be able to naturally grow Aloe Vera and most likely use a powdered version which is cheaper to ship. Another way you can tell is if the company uses “ecological or organic Aloe Vera” and the label says “non-EU agriculture” then you know it has been shipped from overseas and then probably is a powdered version.
We have don our best to give you the true benefits of Aloe Vera and we truly hope you will enjoy our range of Aloe Vera Skincare products. We would love to get any feedback you might have no matter you oppinion.