Member Reviews

This book was very fascinating and it definitely teaches readers about natural beauty and skincare. While the writing is good, it is probably not a book for beginners as there are a lot of ingredients and recipes that most people would not attempt to make. I did love how many recipes were included however and they tied together the learning at the beginning of the book well.

Was this review helpful?

I received a ARC of this book for review . My opinion is my own.
I have been using natural homemade skin care for many years with natural ingredients. I was thrilled to receive this book for review but found it does not transfer well to PDF and I was unable to read most of it. What I was able to read was informative and helpful . I appreciate the information on the various carrier oils and how to incorporate low price ingredients into our home beauty products.
Once you begin making your own products you will never go back to using chemical based drugstore products. This is a great guide for a beginner as well as someone like me that has been making their own face products. i found it well researched and full of useful information as well as recipes.
I do recommend buying this book as it does not transfer well to PDF and does not work on Kindle. It is a book to keep in your personal library so you may refer to the recipes .

Was this review helpful?

Great book There's a lot of recipes for skin, hair, and body using natural ingredients. The authors have really done their homework. The recipes look easy to do. All the things you need including tools are listed. I think it's a wonderful look for all those who want a natural, fresh beauty regimen. I received this book from Net Galley for an honest review and no compensation otherwise.

Was this review helpful?

Plant-Powered Beauty is a beautiful book. It's aesthetically pleasing like every Pinterest board you follow, every Instagram you wish was yours. However, unlike Pinterest and Instagram, Plant-Powered Beauty is jam packed with interesting and verified information. Their list of sources is long and strong, and their recipes tried and true.

The introduction to their book alone taught me more than I ever thought I needed to know about reading beauty labels. Once inside, I focused most of my intentions on the synergy oil recipes, because they were so methodical in their translation. I feel truly empowered by this book to make my own oil synergies and experiment with topical skin care potions and serums. I'm a total dummy when it comes to DIY, so their charts and step-by-steps made it so easy to believe I can do this on my own.

Was this review helpful?

Plant-Powered Beauty by Galper and Daigneault is your handbook to beautiful skin without the harsh chemicals and byproducts you may find in drugstores and expensive makeup shops. This book teaches you how to make your own masks, serums, cleansers, moisturizers, and much more using the powerful benefits of natural ingredients. Best of all, you can do it yourself from home!

Included are over 50 recipes for you to try that are for your skin, hair and scalp! It is also a great resource guide to essential oils. Especially if you are a newbie like me, who doesn't know the benefits of each type of oil. Along with beautiful photos and detailed instructions, this is the perfect handbook for all your natural skincare needs.

Was this review helpful?

This book gave a lot of detailed information and helpful hints as well as how to do information. I loved the thoroughness.

Was this review helpful?

There are a lot of people out there who are doing research into what all consumers consume at any given time. It is for those people who make a conscious effort to keep an eye on what goes into the products on their shelf.This book is like that big encyclopedia that used to be an investment (at least that was the case at my home) which was to be brought down from the shelf to give a detailed answer to what we wanted to know before Google came. This is a very extensive book. It has possibly all the information one would ever need to curate completely natural and homemade beauty products. By beauty products, I do not mean makeup but cleaning, cleaning and probably cheering as well. It looks like a very involved process to get the end results and I would assume someone with a strong will, and a big kitchen, time and interest would devour the book.

It is a very well presented book of all the exhaustive information(with some very nice pictures) we could ever want in terms of plant powered products.I really enjoyed the content, and maybe, just maybe I can rouse myself to try out a couple of the recipes.

Was this review helpful?

I am always searching for more ways that I can use healthy and natural items around my house, so when I saw this book on NetGalley I thought it could be helpful.  Thank you NetGalley for giving me a copy of this book.

At 256 pages this book was a fairly quick read.  It was easy to follow along with, and I definitely learned some things. I'll be looking closer at the products that I buy from now on because of this book. 

I don't think that I will be able to use any of the recipes in this book for awhile. Like a lot of books that you read when wanting to go organic and all natural, this book seems to be written for stable middle class to rich people.  I would have to buy so many ingredients to be able to make the products in this book, and that's just not feasible for a young couple with one person in grad school and the other working as a freelancer.  So that of course disappointed me. I wanted a book that would be a little more accessible. 

So in the end I gave this book 3 stars, I do think it could be helpful for me in the future. And maybe it could be a helpful book for you!

Was this review helpful?

Having dabbled in the art of making salves and skin care products since my childhood, learning about herbs and essential oils at my grandmother's kitchen table, I was sceptical when I opened this book.

Then I was surprised at the detailed information the book contains. From learning about what the label of your store bought beauty product contains, to what properties a wide range of natural ingredients have, to which ingredients and materials to use in your own, home made beauty products, and how to avoid germ contamination in your kitchen.

This book introduces the art of making your own skin care products to the novice "kitchen apothecary", as well as contains information for experienced crafters in this field.

Was this review helpful?

Wow! The pictures are beautiful and the ideas are delightful. There are major details about plant-powered beauty in this book. Whatever you want to know, need to know and didn't know you need to know about the subject is included. It is a perfect guide! You will learn so much and have many options of what you want to do or make. Tips are helpful and everything in this book is useful.

Was this review helpful?

I've read a few all-natural beauty books and this is one of the best so far. I like how it explains "How the skin works" since that's not something we think of in general. It's not an overall science-y book (yay!) and breaks down how to take care of different skin types (I focused on the dry, aging, and mature skin type) and the difference in extraction of plants. This is a great resource book that I'd need to revisit on occasion since it has so much information!

Was this review helpful?

If anyone is looking for a book that is a simple, comprehensible guideline about natural ingredients for your body and health, this is what you should add to your collection! This book is perfect for any beginners wanting to get into natural and organic health products. There are recipes, tips, and guidelines about products most people don't think twice about when buying certain products. I love how precise the information is and I would recommend this to anyone wanting to make better choices in cosmetics. I will be adding this to my collection!

I love how they expose ingredient lists on everyday products. Our skin and overall health is so important and I'm glad that people are banding together to make healthier decisions. #Imhereforit

Thank you NetGalley and BenBella Books for letting me read this book! ♥♥

Was this review helpful?

Plant-Powered Luxury:

Have you ever been pampered in a natural beauty spa, enveloped by the beautiful scents of carefully selected essential oil blends? This is what you can recreate in your home by using the recipes in this book. I have been interested in aromatherapy and making my own skin care products for over 30 years and I can say that this book is a gem. The authors use only the best ingredients in their formulations that turn out very luxurious products. For example, yesterday I made the Moisturizing Body Oil for Super Dry Skin and it feels and smells fabulous. I applied the oil after a shower this morning and it absorbed into the skin quickly and smelled amazing. Now, after a whole day, my skin still feels silky soft. All recipes are listed by volume (tablespoons, teaspoons, drops), which makes measuring very easy. There is really no need to measure more precisely. Do not believe you cannot afford all the fancy ingredients used in this book. It is not a big deal to start out with a few high quality ingredients and build from there. Also,if you do not have a particular ingredient at hand, the informational ingredient charts make it easy to switch out ingredients that have similar properties. I am happy I found a couple of oils and botanical ingredients that I have not tried yet and cannot wait to use them in my own body products. I also like that the authors recommend to the readers to use their own intuition and come up with their own recipes. Amy Galper and Christina Daigneault truly are experts in their field who have put a lot of thought into their formulations. For me, there is something deeply satisfying about making my own beauty products. I like this book so much that I bought the kindle version of it although I have already received a free electronic copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. In my opinion this book deserves 10 stars. Go and buy this book! You will not regret it!

Was this review helpful?

Incredibly detailed and very helpful! Well formulated recipes, focused on sanitation and proper use, and gave a lot of very informative charts on ingredients. For a person who suffers from side effects to chemicals from pretty much every beauty products ,like myself, this book is a little treasure.

Was this review helpful?

This book is gorgeous from front to back. I love the idea of natural beauty-actually being natural. I get excited starting off that I may actually be able to change my routine with new products that I made from scratch. To be honest, I love the idea of all of that and that it will make me a better person. In reality, this is a life style change. I am not ready for that type of commitment nor do I think this change would be sustainable.

I came to this realization after spending weeks with this book. These recipes are intricate and intimidating, I even put this down for a couple days and came back to it hoping for a fresh perspective. I am a newbie, excited to learn and grow with natural beauty that will be sustainable in my lifestyle. This book is not for me. This book is more for the experienced that want to take it to the next level. That is the only reason I give it three stars.
I was given an ARC of this book through NetGalley and the publishers for an honest review.

Was this review helpful?

This is positively lovely- chock full of information about skincare, how it works, what goes into it and most importantly, how to make your own. I already have an interest in medicinal herbs so this was a beautiful addition to my collection and introduced me to some deeper thinking, particularly about essential oils, blends and the effect of certain ingredients on the skin. Perfect for anyone with even a mild interest in this area!

Was this review helpful?

I was unable to read this title on my kindle, sadly, so I am unable to provide a review because I didn't get to read it.

Was this review helpful?

As someone with multiple allergies and sensitivities, navigating the aisles of skincare, cosmetics and other personal care products is really not easy, so this book appealed to the part of me that might consider making my own products. But I found that anyone on the multi-allergic or multi-sensitivities side would not be able to use many of the recipes in this collection, as most of them use essential oils and such, which is not surprising as both of the contributors are big on aromatherapy.

This is definitely not a book on how to use plant-based materials that you would commonly have around your home or kitchen, like oatmeal, sugar, honey etc. Making the items in this book will require some extra shopping, so you have to be pretty keen. I was a bit surprised at how much stuff went into producing some of the recipes. Much of it is not easily accessible in my part of the world for sure, and many of the ingredients, such as a wide variety of essential oils, some of the less common seed oils, various kinds of dried flowers, and blending ingredients including clays, salts, gums, butters and waxes would also not be easily purchased online to my locale. Plus, it would begin to get pretty expensive. But if you live in California or large cities or thereabouts, then I suspect you would have more access to suppliers.

The book is quite attractively produced, with nice photos, and quite a lot of information - maybe enough to start producing a whole skincare line if you were motivated enough.

Was this review helpful?

I couldn't read all of this but it has a lot of information that can be usual especially if you are looking for a more natural beauty regime. It tells you about different types of ingredients and a variety of other usual information when it comes to beauty products.

Was this review helpful?

Plant-Powered Beauty by Amy Galper; Christina Daigneault is a lovely and informative read that I will go back to again and again. Full of insightful information. I love the recipes in this book and have used many of them

Was this review helpful?