Plant butters are fats that melt at skin temperature and hold water inside your skin for hours. Shea holds longest, cocoa seals hardest, mango sinks in fastest - layered together they cover all three speeds. The trick: apply on damp skin, always.
What a butter actually is
A plant butter is simply a fat that's solid at room temperature and melts at skin temperature - pressed from a seed or nut instead of churned from milk. That melting point is the whole magic. It goes on solid, turns silky on contact, and leaves a fine layer that holds water inside your skin for hours.
The three, and their different jobs
- Shea, from the West African shea nut, is the slow one - thick, rich, and long-holding, the butter for skin that's dry by afternoon.
- Cocoa, from the same bean as chocolate (yes, it smells like it), is the sealer - the firmest of the three, the one that locks everything down.
- Mango, pressed from the mango kernel, is the light one - melts fastest, absorbs quickest, no heaviness.
One holds, one seals, one sinks in.
Why formulas use all three
Because skin wants all three speeds. A lotion built on a single butter is either rich but greasy or light but gone by lunch. Layer the melting points and you get moisture that starts fast and lasts - which is why Stretch Heal Lotion carries shea, mango and cocoa together, and why Pure Pout is basically the three butters and almost nothing else.
The one trick that changes everything
Butters hold water in; they don't add it. Apply them to damp skin - straight after your bath, before the towel finishes its work - and they trap that water where you want it. Same jar, twice the result. It's the cheapest upgrade in skincare and nobody's grandmother forgot it.
Where else they sit in our range
Shea cushions the Body Smoothener so it polishes without stripping, and anchors Hydraheal Lotion for the dry postpartum months. If your skin feels tight an hour after moisturising, a butter-led formula - on damp skin - is the answer to try first.
