Weleda Insight Day 2014: Part Two

Last week I began sharing my thoughts on my recent visit to the beautiful Weleda gardens in Derbyshire, so here we are... part two.

Following a lovely morning at the Weleda gardens, we returned to HQ for a chance to chat about the morning's tour over a light (but very tasty) lunch.

Some of our exceedingly tasty lunch

We began the afternoon by finding out a little more about beginnings of Weleda and some of their products and also found out some fascinating nuggets of information and trivia. For instance; did you know that the name Weleda comes from Veleda, a Priestess who lived in the first century and that the logo was designed by Rudolph Steiner himself?

The Weleda Logo

The logo depicts a staff and weaving line in the centre of two wavy lines. The staff is said to represent Mercury the Roman God of (amongst other things) communication and the weaving line, a serpent; a symbol of healing. The two outer lines represent man and nature and their relationship with medicine (physician:patient).

Did you also know that the best selling product in the UK is Skin Food? The famed multi-purpose cream is a favourite amongst Make-up Artists and used by the tube at London Fashion Week!

I could carry on reciting some of the many fascinating facts we learnt about the company, however I will move on...

Birch Oil is a favourite in France

Weleda Insight Days are a now annual event that gives Journalists, Beauty Insiders, Bloggers, Therapists and many more the opportunity to go behind the scenes of the company, visit their beautiful Biodynamic gardens and find out more about the products.

The focus of the particular day that I visited was body-care (natural health and facial skincare were the topics for other days - sadly my availability didn't tally with the facial skincare day); with this in mind we looked in depth at the various body-care collections that Weleda offer.

With many big brands jumping on the natural bandwagon sadly a lot of greenwashing goes on these days, however with Weleda you get exactly what it says on the box. No banding about of consumer enticing key eco words, just pure, unadulterated honesty.

The collections are named by their lead plant ingredient and are grouped together as such in colour families. The lead plant may not be the ingredient with the highest concentration or quantity, however it is the therapeutic properties of that denote it's stature.

Citrus: Lime Green - Invigorating

Birch: Dark Green - Detoxifying

Pomegranate: Red - Rejuvinating

Sea Buckthorn: Orange - Revitalising

Wild Rose: Pink - Nourishing
Lavender: Purple - Relaxing & Calming

There are others, however these are the main collections within bodycare.

Finally there was a chance to have a play with many of the skincare products available on the market, plus a few of the products due to be hitting the shelves over the coming months. With bowls of water and bottles of lotions and potions laid out before us, it was lovely to be able to work our way through the products comparing them thoroughly (something that you don't get to do fully in stores). This playtime certainly gave me some ideas as to which products I plan to stock up on in the future!

Our Goodie Bags

As the day came to a close we were given a parting gift of a goodie bag full of various bits and pieces from across the different collections and also an opportunity to spend some pennies (or just browse) at the onsite pharmacy; a very dangerous place I can assure you! In a rush to get my train, I quickly picked up a couple of products that I knew I needed but then had to dash and so I didn't give the pharmacy the time it really needed (my bank balance is probably thankful for that!), however I will ensure I make time for a proper trip next time I am in the area.

One of the things that stood out above all else was that all of the staff are very clearly passionate about the company and their role within it. The enthusiasm with which they spoke about the products and the brand was intoxicating and their knowledge base was great. It was fantastic to see so many genuinely positive responses and to see the sparkles in their eyes when they shared their thoughts.

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As I am sure you can gather from the past two posts, I thoroughly loved my day in Deryshire and have already put my name down for next years event - roll on 2015!

www.weleda.co.uk