A Rose Water and Pearl Powder Cold Cream
An 17th century cold cream recreated from the 1696 English edition of Simon Barbe’s The French Perfumer.
Handmade in small batches, these 3/4 oz. and 2 oz. all-natural, delicately scented creams are made with just five ingredients — including luxurious real powdered pearl — to deliver a deeply moisturizing experience. Each pomatum tin has individual flourished labels and is shipped in kraft-paper packaging — all so you can experience life as a member of the late-Renaissance gentry, receiving a delivery from your favorite apothecary.
I typically sell the 3/4 oz. cold cream for $12, and 2 oz. for $30; contact me if interested in a larger number and/or a shipping estimate.
Special orders available, and preorders encouraged due to small batch numbers! Keep reading for more information about this balm…
Ingredients List for Pearl Pomatum (version 2.0)
- sweet almond oil
- beeswax
- rose water
- baking soda
- pearl powder
Each batch makes approximately five 3/4 oz. tins, and takes about 75 minutes in total (or two and a half episodes of Wellington Paranormal, if you’re curious about how I keep time).
Why does it say “version 2.0”?
Because historical recipes don’t write down everything — much like modern recipes don’t always tell you “how” to fold in the cheese! — recreating these recipes requires a lot of trial and error. I’m always looking to perfect this balm, and I love to experiment with different variations on the process and the ingredients, so the numbers may keep moving up.
All balms are labeled with their version number — if you find that I’ve moved on to the next variation, but you love the one you have, just let me know! Because I work in small batches, I can easily remake the version you want to keep on hand.
Working from the original
One of the things I love about recreating these recipes is that it’s something that I, with no real training except a love of history, can do on my own — and so can you! There are new historical recipe books being digitized daily, available online for free. Pearl Pomatum got its name from the surprisingly rare inclusion of powdered pearl in a recipe for cold cream that’s survived centuries — so far I’ve only found it in two places, Simon Barbe’s The French Perfumer and Nicolas Lémery’s Arcana Curiosa (the same book I found the lip balm in!). I encourage you to look for yourself and explore these books and beyond!
Working from my example
Like I said above, the road to experimental archaeology is one of trial and error (mostly error!). Anyone can start experimenting like me — to learn more about how I recreated this balm, or see what further research I do, you can find my write-ups here: Regarding pearl pomatum.
Historically “Inaccurate” (and related safety warnings)
While I have a lot of fun recreating these recipes and I hope you enjoy them as well, here are some important reminders:
- Some historical ingredients are poisonous, difficult to source, or actually illegal to source, so most products I develop aren’t fully historically “accurate.” If I can’t omit the ingredient or find a reasonable alternative, I won’t be selling it.
- These products are created for entertainment and educational purposes only, in small batches in my studio and kitchen (and, therefore, under non-sterile-factory conditions where cross-contamination is possible). The safety of these products has not been determined; I self-test everything I sell, and I don’t sell things I don’t love, but keep your own safety in mind first.
- Because I’m trying to recreate recipes that may need to have adjustments to processes or ingredients for safety reasons (or because I’m trying to work out how to actually follow the directions I find), everything I make here has to be considered, baseline, historically inaccurate. Don’t rely solely on my ingredients lists as a historical source; if you have any questions or want to dig into what I may have changed, feel free to drop me a line!
Katherine Crighton 