Article: Ua Body Story
Ua Body Story
Ua Body Story
Skincare should be simple.
Aloha,
I’m Leala, owner of Ua Body Skincare. Founded on Hawaii island, Ua Body, is a new skincare company with a long legacy. Inspired by a love of flowers and the natural beauty of Hawaii, my mother started this company 30 years ago in our home kitchen. I observed and helped her as she steeped and extracted herbs and flowers, blended fragrances and oils, then tested and rejected recipe after recipe – all to create the type of skincare she desired. After she passed, my husband and I wanted to continue her legacy so we created Ua Body. Meaning “rain” in Hawaiian, Ua pronounced (oo-uh), speaks to the nurturing and healing effect of nature. Here’s a little bit of our backstory being a second generation skincare company.
Let’s start at the beginning. When my mother and father moved here from France, she couldn’t find the skincare she was familiar with. As a lei maker and gardener, she knew of the healing effects of plant-based ingredients and so she learned how to do botanical infusions in different natural oils. She started her line, Island Herbal, based on these oils which she turned into salves and creams for different skin irritations and ailments. Island Herbal was her botanical skincare line.
However being in Hawaii, not everyone wanted to smell like comfrey, or tea tree and lavender, they wanted something tropical. And so she created The Hawaiian Spa, a line of skincare with fragrances more typically associated with Hawaii. Fragrances of Kupaloke, Pikake, and Kiele (tuberose and jasmine and gardenia) began to fill our home. She added local coconut and kukui nut oils. There was Mango Mango, Coconut, Tahitian Vanilla, many fragrances, each singular and true to its name. It is with this line that we started Ua Body, although we trimmed it down to the best sellers of Kupaloke, Pikake, and Kiele. It is called our Heritage Line.
In addition to the Heritage line, we have started our new Ua product line with our own vision - the Essentials line. We believe “skincare should be simple,” and this statement carries through to every aspect of our product line. Each product is handcrafted in small batches in our workshop nestled in Waimea on Hawaiʻi Island. We focus on developing high-quality, clean, additive-free formulas consisting of natural and native ingredients to replenish, hydrate, and protect the skin.
We partner with local farmers and producers. In doing this, we capture the abundance of natural resources found right here in Hawaii. An example of this is our sandalwood partner, who harvests truly organic sandalwood from fallen or damaged trees, which in turn helps new trees to grow and replenishes land damaged from overgrazing.
In an effort to reduce single-use plastic, we package our products in glass and paper. To further our efforts, we donate 1.5% of each sale to the Hawaiian Conservation Alliance and dry forest initiatives of Hawaii, whose mission is to preserve the culture, land and oceans that we call home.
We hope that Ua Body becomes a part of your daily ritual, bringing the aloha spirit wherever you go.
-Leala Humbert, Co-Founder
