Geraniums for Skincare

After a streak of sunny days, mother nature decided to bring the gloom, and I never pass the opportunity gloom provides to indulge in relaxation and pampering, isn’t this what rainy days were created for?

The flower buds are on the brink of opening, but it looks like they decided to wait for the sunshine before doing that.

Back to the pampering, what better plant to chose to represent all things indulgent for skin care than the geranium? Well, maybe not this specific variety.
Rose geranium essential oil has been a staple ingredient for perfumery and skin care for a very long time. Just like its regular counterpart, the rose oil, it is very useful for mature skin, because it moisturizes it and helps restore its elasticity. There are many benefits associated with the use of geranium oil, from reducing wrinkles to improving complexion color and texture, but its therapeutic properties go further than skin deep, quite literally, to revitalize muscle tone, improve hormonal balance and stimulate cell growth.

Geranium oil also provides relief for irritable or breakout prone skin. It acts as a gentle cleanser and mild antiseptic and its soothing fragrance calms both the body and the mind. Rose and rose geranium are frequently used together in skin care products to take advantage of their synergistic benefits.

The essential oil is, of course, obtained through steam distillation, which has the highest concentration of active ingredients and requires specialized equipment to extract. If you would still like to make your own but don’t want to go to all that trouble, the infused oil is always an option, just pack the bruised leaves tightly in a jar, cover them with a good quality oil and leave them in a sunny window for a month, stirring and replacing the green matter every few days to get a higher concentration of active ingredients. Even so, the infused oil can’t match the potency of the one obtained through distillation, but it is perfect for a massage or bath oil.