"If we eat clean food why on earth aren't we putting it on our skin?"
Cindy Lüken is a food scientist and the founder of lük beautifood, a natural makeup brand from Sydney. She studied food and nutrition, and she makes her lipsticks from food-grade ingredients.
Her motto is "be delicious, inside and out".
Why a food scientist started making lipstick
Cindy first saw how lipstick was made by accident. When she looked into it, she found lipsticks are made of oils, waxes, butters, binders, colours and flavours, and to her the recipe "looked a lot like a chemical cocktail".
So she started making her own with skin foods. She calls her makeup "skincare with colour", and her rule is to "highlight not hide".
The food-grade ingredients in every lük lipstick
The base is avocado oil, sesame seed oil and cocoa butter, which lük calls its AAA Hydra-Soft Complex. Cindy chose them for their antioxidants and omega 3 and 6 essential fatty acids.
There's also castor seed oil, jojoba, beeswax, candelilla and carnauba waxes and vitamin E, and the colour comes from natural pigments.
The flavour comes from culinary essential oils, and each shade has its own blend. Tea Rose has lemon, rosemary and peppermint, Chai Shimmer has cinnamon bark and vanilla, and Rose Lime has lime, ginger and pink grapefruit.
Inside Lip Nourish
The lük beautifood Lip Nourish is Cindy's sheer lipstick for everyday wear. She made it for anyone with dry lips who needs lip balm all day. It's soft and creamy, and it's not too shiny or too pigmented, so it works on a bare face, at the gym or with a full face of makeup.
It builds from a sheer tint to a rich colour with a dewy satin finish, and it's made in Australia. The shades go from nudes and neutrals through to corals, berries and reds, and there are two Tasting Plates to try them first.
Cindy's trick for the perfect natural lip
Line the lips with a nude pencil that matches the natural lip colour. Then apply Tea Rose Lip Nourish straight from the stick or with a lip brush. If Tea Rose is a little too blue for the skin tone, add Chai Shimmer over the top.
Cindy's skin foods
Cindy also shared the foods she eats for her skin. She loves beetroot and berries for anthocyanins, the antioxidants that give them their deep red and purple colour, and lemons for vitamin C, which our skin needs to make collagen. For iron, she goes for red meat, oysters, white beans or dark chocolate ("yummo!").
About the Author
Irene Falcone is the founder of Clean Nectarine and co-host of The Lee & Irene Show. She started her first clean beauty business in 2011 with $100 in her garage and grew it to $20m in four years. She has spent over 15 years reading the backs of beauty and wellness labels, is a Telstra Business Women's Awards winner and an EY Entrepreneur of the Year finalist, and has been featured on A Current Affair, The Project, Sunrise, Channel Nine Mornings and Sky News.
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