Introducing Our Powder to Gel Hand Wash

A powder-to-gel hand wash was the perfect complement to our existing body wash and shampoo—another step closer to our vision of a full bathroom completely free of plastic waste. But completing the lineup meant tackling a unique formulation challenge.

The transition from body care to hand care sounds simple on paper, but hands are a completely different beast. Think about what your hands encounter in a single day compared to what your body wash handles in a standard shower. A hand wash has to be stronger; it needs the lifting power to instantly break down heavy oils, grease, and stubborn grime.

The trap most brands fall into is cranking up harsh surfactants to get that deep clean, which inevitably strips away the essential oils and hydration your hands rely on. Because you wash your hands multiple times a day, their moisture barrier is constantly under siege. We refused to sell a compromise that left you with dry, tight skin. Instead, we spent months engineering a formula that delivers a heavy-duty clean while actively protecting your skin barrier—proving that a plastic-free routine can still be premium skincare.

The first challenge was the skin barrier of the hands. Unlike the skin on your arms or chest, your hands are exposed to constant friction, environmental stressors, and multiple washes a day. It’s a high-contact environment that needs to be deeply sanitized without being stripped dry, which is a delicate chemical tightrope. We had to introduce hand-specific ingredients designed to target intense hydration and skin barrier repair.

We went through dozens of tweaks to the surfactant ratios. In our early trials, the formula was either too aggressive, leaving skin feeling tight and dry like paper, or too mild, failing to cut through stubborn grease and kitchen messes. We were looking for a mechanical balance: a formula that could instantly lift heavy grime without compromising the natural oils that keep your hands resilient and soft.

Finding the right ingredients was only half the battle. Then came the “feel.” A powder-to-gel hand wash lives or dies by its consistency. If the mixture is too thin, it feels watery and slips right through your fingers. If it’s too thick, it won't pump smoothly and will clog the bottle.

We trialed the formula several times, focusing on two specific metrics: consistency and skin-feel.

• The Consistency Test: We adjusted the base formula repeatedly to ensure that it's not too thick or runny when mixed with water.

• The Skin-Feel Test: We needed to ensure that once your hands dried, they felt deeply hydrated and soft, without leaving any sticky film or greasy residue behind.

This meant going back to our ingredients and swapping out conditioning agents. We tested how the formula interacted with both soft and hard water, ensuring that the Canadian-made integrity held up regardless of which sink you were washing your hands at.

This level of iteration is only possible in small-batch production. We don’t have a massive factory churning out thousands of gallons of generic liquid. We have the ability to stop, tweak, and re-test until the formula earns its place in our lineup.

Switching to a powder to gel hand wash is a shift in how you think about your daily personal care ritual. You are using a product that has been stripped of the filler and the fluff, leaving only the active ingredients that we spent months perfecting. It’s a return to direct, effective care.