Liorrh's thread on topical idebenone got me thinking about homebrewing my own antioxidant face cream. The following vitamins/nutraceuticals come to mind:

-Vitamins C, E, and A (in the form of retinyl palmitate)
-ALA
-Co Q10 and idebenone
-DMAE
-Pycnogenol
-Astaxanthin
-Hyaluronic acid
-Grapeseed extract/ GTE (?)
-Aloe vera
-Carnosine

As I have little experience formulating my own topicals, I have no idea which of these actives would be suitable for the Phlogel carrier. As I understand it, Phlogel is am amphiphilic carrier and will hold 100 mg of actives per ml (correct me if I'm mistaken). Any ideas?

Found a pharmacy that sells a wide range of skin care products at good prices

http://www.krippspharmacy.com/SkinCareProd...Information.htm

Be very careful with ALA, use a low dose. It can "burn" the skin at high enough concentrations. I made that mistake myself once.

Thanks for the heads up stellar...what concentration of ALA would you recommend? Do you have any experience homebrewing this type of product?

Isn't phlogel formulated to pass through the dermis? The actives should get into the dermis, obviously, but it seems like it might be a bit overkill.

I'd do some research on other ALA face creams and see what they use and go from there.

Just be careful, and apply whatever you make to a small patch of skin on your arm or something and leave overnight to see if it causes irritation. This is your face were talking about, after all.

Sounds expensive, you'd be better off spending some time researching on an alternative-lifestyle forum, just make sure to have stuff like a good Heath Ledger avatar

Alternative lifestyle forum? Are you talking about imminst or another such forum?

Part of the reason I'm interested in formulating my own product is because the vast majority of anti-wrinkle products on the market are vastly overpriced. My mother uses a vitamin C serum made by ROC (I think) and the price is ridiculous considering the cream contains only one active ingredient. What about all the other antioxidants - not only the usual offenders such as retinol and vitamin E but also less common additions such as idebenone and astaxanthin? Apart from additional antioxidants, the formula lacks ingredients that increase moisture retention such as napca and HA. The point of my experiment is to formulate a cream that includes all the tried and true active ingredients at a fraction of the cost (per gram of cream that is...the initial investment for the powders will be quite expensive).

BTW, I'll pass on the Heath Ledger avatar! How about Orlando Bloom? j/k

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