about us

At Read/the/label we make useful, everyday natural body and skincare products, sustainable, plant based, synthetic free and beautiful.’ 

organic personal care products

Useful : Its our ethos to be useful by creating natural face and body care that address the concerns and solves the problems of day to day skincare in this environment, with so many man made chemicals intertwined in our skincare its hard to find your way.  So we don’t over complicate our products with complex multi level formulas, we are much closer to nature through our plant based ingredients and a thoughtful method of production.
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Environmental: we like infinitely recyclable glass jars for our creams and and salves, recycled and plastic free packaging, and naked soaps. We choose responsible production methods, avoid any ingredients that are not sustainably produced or that fail to biodegrade into our waste system ultimately our planets' water and earth.
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Beautiful: looking and feeling good is a choice, surround yourself with beauty and be inspired by colours, textures, patterns and aromas, we have all that and more in our minimalist / hygge inspired products.

 

 

Let’s Start From the Beginning...read/the/label

2003

As a therapist and spa manager in northern Europe we offered alongside our commercial skincare range natural body care treatments using ground down formulations, brown sugar, crushed lemon, grated ginger for body scrubs, coffee facials, chocolate or honey and eucalyptus infused body massage treatments.

‘For customers prone to multiple skin allergies, eczema, psoriasis and sensitivities we would use our natural range. In our commercial skincare range there was a lack of natural, gentle products, almost all ingredients were synthetic which worked for some people but were becoming less popular with our customers. With a demand for truly natural skincare the seed was sown to find out how to test and approve our products for our allergy prone customers. That was the beginning to the ‘why’ we should make products and began a search for many plant based ingredients that could also be effective for skincare problems.’

 

2008

We began to make our own creams and slaves, skincare soaps and macerations, aromatherapy blends and for the next 2 years we researched, studied and understood the principles of skincare formulation. We searched the high street for brands that were natural and organic looking for inspiration but found so called natural brands almost entirely synthetic ingredients and the methods to produce the ingredients totally disastrous for the environment.

‘With so much misleading marketing from brands and the guidelines set down for cosmetic formulations by organic associations not quite stringent we decided to define what natural and organic really means, this was simple, no one could argue if all our ingredients where literally picked from a tree and put into a product.’

Our ingredients : Natural, extra virgin, cold pressed, raw, unrefined, wild harvested, organic, vegan, preferring non mass agricultural plant based oils and butters.

2010

The first range of tested and approved products are ready it took a while to reach the stringent regulation for selling products, I was very lucky to be working with a cosmetic scientist thoughout this time. All products had to be cruelty-free, paraben, phthalates, SLS, SLES free and synthetic preservative free, fragrance and colour free. Also making sure our plant based spa type products work for every budget.
 

We started trading read/the/label at London markets, spitalfields, trumen brewery, Camden market and festivals in the UK. Getting inspired and defining what people liked and disliked, new ideas and better methods, defining formulas and what read the label is all about.

 

2012

After 2 years of product research and development and fine tuning products through the direct feedback from our customers we relaunched the first range that would periodically be updated over the next 5 years. Never sacrificing our ethical practise over making a profit and never use aggressive ingredients or synthetic chemicals, sls, parabens, phthalates, petrochemicals,  or synthetic fragrances or colourants.

 
‘Preservative free : this was a defining milestone in our formulations, preservatives in water based products are necessary but can cause skin problems in many people, deciding to make all products without preservative led to much experimentation and defiing a formulation strategy that would use natural preservatives, less water, 100% of ingredients that played an active part in great skincare and not just to combine or smooth or colour’. Including non RBD ingredients.
 

2017

From a stable trading presence in london Camden market and a growing online demand we started to expand into stores that shared the same principles as read the label, independent wholefood stores and the rise of zero waste stores became a new home for our products, mainly our skincare soaps.  

2019

We managed to see 'read the label' skincare and zero waste soaps in 37 stores in the UK,  We received countless testimonials from grateful customers who are relieved to have finally found products that resolved a skin problem. 

Present day

Read / the / label is Useful / Environmental / Beautiful and has become the ethos of read the label With years of knowledge and experience as a therapist and producer, I cant say I have reached any particular height of achievement yet! I enjoy what I do and with our subscription box released this year I am looking forward to reaching many more people with our natural products.  Read the label products are made with 100% active natural, organic and vegan ingredients and the feeling we get from creating something useful and effective makes it all worthwhile!” 
Read / the / Label