Giving Your Skin The Best: Consider Tamanu
On the horizon is an aromatherapy carrier oil just being recognized as the perfect oil for aging skin care and prevention. It might not even have celebrity endorsement, but it’s worthy of it. The oil is called Tamanu, and comes from islands in the South Pacific. Indigenous island cultures have used the oil for healing every conceivable skin condition for a very long time.
There’s been a significant amount of research performed on the oil in the last two years, validating its variety of skin care therapeutic properties. It’s a perfect oil to make a wound healing blend with, using helichrysum or calendula essential oils, or an anti-aging blend, for both prevention as well as reduction of wrinkle appearance.
In “Cosmetic Research”, a review of the data regarding the oil was presented. It focused on the healing properties of the oil: It causes the skin to increase production of new cells, just as many tried and true anti-aging creams – but with no known downside from using too much. Like rosehip seed oil, and vitamin-a compounds, increasing the rate of skin growth will reduce wrinkle appearance. But it’s not just for treatment of aging skin, it’s for prevention tool.
Research being performed to find a non-irritating ultraviolet light absorber found that Tamanu oil was very effective for this use. Such a perfect combination of properties!
On top of all that, it’s been discovered that the oil also inhibits the growth of skin cancer tumors. All that in addition to its antibacterial and antiviral activities really do seem to make Tamanu an ideal carrier oil for beauty care.
Seems to have it all, doesn’t it? The only drawbacks are the cost – its popularity and difficulty in harvesting lead to a higher price than many carrier oils – and its slightly “off” aroma. This is due to the aging of the nuts for several months before pressing of the oil. Yet this aging process is known to increase the therapeutic efficacy of the oil.
You can certainly use the oil by itself, and many people do. It blends nicely with other carrier oils as well, and for a great array of essential fatty acids, you could mix it with virgin coconut, argan oil, rosehip seed oil and borage seed oil.
An example recipe may be made of a base of equal parts tamanu, rosehip and argan oils. Add to this formula one or more essential oils that assist with skin rejuvenation and you’ll have as good a product as any on the market today. Next time you’re creating your own skin care beauty recipe, seriously consider adding Tamanu – you can see that it really may do all that you’d ever wanted in a skin care formula.
There’s so much more to learn! For more info than you could have ever imagined, check out The Ananda Apothecary’s “Essential Oils and Aroma-therapeutics for Everyone Blog.