What Makes a Clean Vegan Perfume?

Style & Beauty

Mar 16

When it comes to perfume I love clean and fresh scents. I also find that a lot of conventional perfumes contain unnatural ingredients and are very overpowering so I was thrilled when Medeau reached out to let me know about their gorgeous first scent ‘Origin’ which is carefully designed so as not to include parabens, phthalates, harmful musks, stabilisers, dyes or allergens. It is also vegan and cruelty free and so beautiful.

There are two important components to making a vegan perfume. Firstly, the perfume cannot contain ingredients from animal-derived products. Additionally, but often overlooked, is that the perfume should not be tested on animals. Medeau’s perfumes satisfy both of those criteria.

Fragrance sensitivity is one of the leading causes of allergies in adults and affects people with asthma or other respiratory illness more severely. The most common symptoms of perfume allergy include: breathing difficulties, headache, skin irritation, muscle aches, eye irritation, sneezing, coughing and runny nose, dizziness, fatigue, inability to concentrate, swelling, and nausea.

Top notes: elderflower, bergamot, rose, green

Heart notes: cyclamen, peony, jasmine, calla lily, iriswood, cedarwood

Base notes: vanilla, heliotrope, amberwood, cashmere musks

What’s lovely about the brand is that it’s sustainable ethos goes beyond what’s in the bottle and focus is also on reducing the environmental and social impact of perfume production.

There are three elements to creating a sustainable perfume. First, no natural ingredient should be used which cannot be grown or farmed sustainably. Examples include certain botanical oils such as sandalwood. The harvesting of the sandalwood tree for the fragrance industry is causing large-scale deforestation which in turn is seeing an increase in the smuggling and trafficking of sandalwood products. The ethical alternative to this is to use a safe synthetic version of this ingredient.

Second, the type of packaging used is important. Boxes certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) guarantee that no deforestation has taken place, that biodiversity and old-growth forests are protected, the cultural rights of indigenous people are upheld, and a safe environment and fair wages for all forest workers are maintained. Furthermore, no pesticides or GMOs are used. It’s also important to look out for the recycle symbol on a perfume box, even if it has an FSC logo – the dye for the text on the box could render it non-recyclable.

Third, perfume companies should seek to keep their carbon footprints as low as possible. Medeau designs, manufactures and fulfils its perfume from the United Kingdom and are working hard to limit the carbon footprint of each bottle.

Medeau uses a combination of both safe synthetics and allergen-free botanicals which guarantee a truly luxurious scent that can replace your favourite perfume, but without making you compromise with your health.