Our story · Est. 2019, London
It started with a cabinet.
A painted, slightly wonky wall cupboard in a London flat, full of bottles that promised everything and explained nothing.
The cabinet, 2019
Every bottle said miracle. None said what was inside.
The cupboard hung above a basin in a rented flat in Hackney, painted a green that was nearly black and never quite level. Inside: a serum that was “revolutionary”, a cream that was “clinically proven” to do something it didn’t name, and an oil that stained the sheets.
The question that started OLIVESKIN was not what to add to that shelf. It was what any of it actually was.
The rule
If we can’t say it plainly, we don’t make it.
So the first bottle was the opposite: a body oil with every ingredient on the label in plain words. What it is, why it’s there, where it comes from. A + beside each one, and a slip of paper that says the rest.
Every product since has had to pass the same test: it has to work, it has to feel good, and it has to be explainable in one sentence. Eight of our nine formulas are COSMOS certified, and we tell you which eight.
The name
Borrowed from a skin tone. Meant for all of them.
Olive is what people call the warm, green-gold undertone that shows up in light, medium and deep skin alike. We borrowed the word because people use it, not because anyone should aim for it.
A tone, not a target. Nothing we make is meant to change the colour of your skin; it’s meant to make it feel good, in any light.
Read about our name
Today
Twenty products, two shelves, and one kept for later.
Today OLIVESKIN is a studio in London and a cabinet of nine: three for the body, six for the face and the sun, and a shelf kept for what comes next. We publish every review, the glowing and the grumpy.
- 4.7 / 5
- from 13,173 verified reviews
- 1.2 million
- bottles shelved since 2019
- 18 of 20
- formulas COSMOS certified
- 31
- countries we deliver to
2019 to 2026
The scrapbook
Eight years, one picture each. Kept in a box in the studio, and now here.
2019
The first cabinet
140 bottles of Body Oil, labelled by hand at the kitchen table and sent to friends. Thirty-one wrote back asking for another.
2020
The label, in plain words
Every ingredient named, every + explained. The Body Cream joins the shelf with 5% urea printed on the front.
2021
A second shelf
Face and sun opens with the Facial Wash and the Vitamin C Serum. Mandarin, not pennies.
2022
Certified, and boxed
Eighteen of twenty formulas COSMOS certified. The carton arrives, with a lid that lifts.
2023
The Studio
The cabinet is built for real as the back wall of our London studio: limestone, linen and a door that sticks in August.
2024
One light, every skin
Our people pictures, one day in a house by the sea, from the morning basin to the steps at midday. And the Sun Stick, small enough for a back pocket.
2025
An award, and everything at once
Best SPF Stick at the Marie Claire Skin Awards. The Whole Cabinet set: every shelf, filled.
2026
Colour, corrected
The Colour Correcting Stick, in four shades. Supplements kept on a shelf of their own, to follow.
People in these pictures are generated placeholders.
A note from the founder
We still keep the first cabinet in the studio. Every new product has to earn its place on that shelf: it has to work, it has to feel good, and it has to be explainable in one sentence. If we can't say it plainly, we don't make it.
The founder
London, 2026
From the first cabinet
The four that started it.
The founder’s own shelf: the first bottle, the first cream and the first two for the face. All four still made to the original formula.
