VIV Says: Blog

Cold comfort: Odacité's mini fridge extends the shelf life of its products.

The spanking-new Odacité skin-care line includes a familiar list of products — cleanser, moisturizer, serum, masque, body lotion, eye cream, exfoliant — plus a couple that are a bit unusual (paper-thin facial sponges, a purse atomizer that comes with a tiny funnel for filling it with Rose Floral Water) and one beauty product we’ve never come across before: a mini fridge. Kind of like a wine cellar for skin care, the sleek unit ($120) keeps the products at an optimal 54–59° F, or approximately 20 degrees above the temperature of your kitchen fridge. This extends the shelf life to six months, which is double the three-month “Freshiency” date, a combination of freshness and efficiency that’s marked on the bottom of each product.

Valerie Grandury, the creator of Odacité, is, as you can tell, a fanatic about freshness. Parisian-born, she was living in the Hollywood Hills and working as a film exec when she was diagnosed with breast cancer five years ago. She sold her house, moved to less smoggy Topanga Canyon, began studying alternative therapy, including the healing power of plants, and embraced a largely raw-food diet. “I wanted to detoxify my life,” she says, “and I realized there were a lot of possibly toxic ingredients in personal-care products.”

Sourcing botanicals and other organic ingredients from all over the world, Grandury created Odacité (a play on “audacity”) with the philosophy, “I won’t put anything on my skin that I wouldn’t eat.” That means no parabens, petrochemicals, formaldehyde, fragrance, etc. Instead, the products rely on natural ingredients like aloe vera, lavender, olive oil, and green and white tea. And to make sure those ingredients retain their effectiveness in fighting oxidation and inflammation — the two processes that accelerate aging — the products are made in small batches and shipped directly from the lab to customers. Even better, Odacité is offering VIV Says readers a 10 percent discount on orders above $150 (just enter the code ”VIVMAG” at checkout).

We think Grandury’s idea of using all-natural ingredients in her products is a good one. What steps are you taking to detoxify your life?