Green Shoots & Gold Cases
There’s a particular kind of quiet that arrives with the first warm days of the season. Not the silence of inactivity, but the poised hush of intention, doors open, curtains lifted, and hands moved instinctively toward old habits made new again. Spring, after all, is as much about what we discard as what we embrace. In wardrobes, this means the soft retirement of wool; in kitchens, a lean towards greens and lighter oils. And in the bathroom, often our most intimate sanctum, it signals the return of touch, scent, and care.
This season, beauty isn't booming, it’s blooming. The shift isn’t only seasonal but philosophical: toward refilled bottles over discarded plastics, unlaboured elegance over lab-manufactured miracles, and routines that feel less like maintenance and more like communion.
A Commune with the Senses
In the gentle hills of the English countryside, something quietly restorative is being brewed. Commune, a haircare brand founded by UK-based duo Rémi Paringaux and Kate Neal, is as much a philosophy as it is a product line. Born of time spent in Vancouver, the brand leans into an ethos of daily ritual and mindful consumption, echoing the region’s reverence for the outdoors and inner balance.
Its shampoo and conditioner, made in small batches with ingredients like sea buckthorn and babassu oil, do more than clean hair. They frame the day. The scent alone, a warm melange of geranium, grapefruit, lavender and cypress, is a subtle transportive gesture: a woodland walk, sunlight caught in resin, the soft crush of leaves underfoot. The aluminium bottles, meant to be refilled rather than tossed, complete the circle of care. Not flashy, but quietly future-minded. The kind of object you keep within arm’s reach, and within sight.
The Red Thread
If haircare has gone pastoral, then lipstick still delights in its high drama. Celine Beauté’s entrance into the cosmetics scene may be relatively recent, but its command is absolute. Rouge Triomphe, the maison’s signature red, is the kind of shade that walks into a room long before its wearer. Inspired by a very Parisian brand of confidence, the satin-finish lipstick is made with sunflower wax and beeswax, giving it a creamy glide and impressive longevity.
The gold bullet is refillable, its design elegant but never overwrought. This spring, the range has expanded to include 14 new hues, fuchsia, rosy nude, even a deep, velvet purple. Not every shade is for every day, and that’s precisely the point. Each colour feels like a choice: one made with clarity, not compulsion.
Walking as Nature Intended
Not all rituals happen at eye level. Birkenstock, the German shoemaker long revered for its unapologetically practical sandals, has launched a line of footcare products that nod to its anatomical origins. It’s an intuitive expansion.
The collection, a scrub, balm, lotion and oil, is firmly rooted in podiatric research, but softened by nature. Rosemary oil, eucalyptus, and menthol blend to nourish tired feet, reviving them with a brisk coolness that hints at forest floors and open windows. Made in Germany, the line honours the brand’s mantra: Naturgewolltes Gehen, walking as nature intended. It is, in many ways, a reminder that care should begin at the base. Feet, so often overlooked, are the very foundation of our days.
The Scent of Renewal
Few scents evoke memory as immediately as cut grass. Fresh, green, slightly bitter, it’s the olfactory shorthand for a thousand childhoods, spring afternoons, and sudden, thrilling rain. For perfumers, bottling that sensation is a pursuit both technical and poetic.
In Pierre Guillaume’s Kerylos 16, the green is rendered with painterly restraint. Inspired by the gardens of the Côte d’Azur, this 2006 composition balances the dewiness of peach with the grounded presence of sycamore wood and tuberose. The result is lush but never cloying—a lawn after rain, not a greenhouse.
Beaufort London takes the opposite approach. Their 2016 scent, built by perfumers Julie Dunkley and Julie Marlowe, is earthy and brooding. Oakmoss, salt, vetiver and patchouli create a fragrance that feels almost tactile, like stepping onto damp soil at low tide. Its appeal lies in its refusal to charm; instead, it insists on being understood.
And then there’s Basilico & Fellini by Italian house Vilhelm Parfumerie, a fragrance that revels in lushness. Named after the director famed for his appetite for beauty, and for basil’s rumoured aphrodisiac qualities, the scent opens with fig and green grass, sweetened by the soft breath of basil. It’s cinematic, yes, but grounded too: an ode to the joys of overgrowth.
A Clearer Complexion
While scent and colour capture the imagination, clarity is sometimes best served plain. Prof Dr Steinkraus, a skincare range founded by Hamburg-based dermatologist Dr Volker Steinkraus, eschews trends for truth. After more than three decades in clinical practice, Steinkraus’ offerings reflect a lifetime of practical knowledge distilled into pared-back formulas.
No parabens, no micro-plastics. Instead: niacinamide, retinol, vitamin C. The unisex line is designed to deliver results without noise, in packaging that reflects its purpose. Lotions, serums, emulsions, the products are not flashy, but they’re reliable. Thoughtful. The kind of thing you come to trust.
Steinkraus’ approach is holistic; skin, he believes, is a reflection of sleep, nutrition and exercise as much as skincare. It’s a refreshing stance in a market often seduced by shortcuts. His perspective is pragmatic, but quietly hopeful. That good habits, well observed, will show in time.
In the end, what unites these seemingly disparate products, from a golden lipstick to a bottle of shampoo or a podiatrist’s balm, is the idea of ritual. Not routine, which can feel obligatory, but ritual: a moment carved out, a practice both small and sacred.
They are objects that speak not of transformation, but of return. To nature. To intention. To a kind of beauty that isn’t bought, but built, stroke by stroke, step by step, day by day.
In a world that moves swiftly, there’s dignity in taking your time. And perhaps even luxury in knowing exactly what to reach for.
In a converted barn tucked into the English countryside, the morning light catches on brushed aluminium bottles: refillable, weighty in the hand, and perfumed with a quiet complexity. This is Commune, a haircare line shaped not in a boardroom but in the long shadows of West Coast hikes and quiet cups of tea. Its founders, guided by a fondness for nature and good design, have distilled that sensibility into a shampoo that smells faintly of cypress and grapefruit, an olfactory handshake with the wild.