Make your own Ultrabalm

A couple of years ago I discovered Ultrabalm, an ointment made by Lush. I regularly suffer from eczema, and Ultrabalm helped a little bit. But when I wanted to buy a new jar, I found out that Lush didn’t make it anymore.

I tried some other cremes and ointments, but still missed Ultrabalm. It was such a nice product, with only three ingredients. And then I got an idea. With only three ingredients, how hard would it be to recreate it? I had never made an ointment before, but when I googled it, it was just a matter of melting wax and mixing it with oil. Sounded pretty doable.

So I decided to give it a go! I ordered the ingredients online (jojoba oil, rose wax, and candelila wax). And a little glass jar to put the end result in.

The only mystery was the ratios of the ingredients. I figured that the main wax component would probably be the candelila wax, because the rose wax had a stronger smell to it. And online I found ratios between wax and oil of 1g:10 ml or so.

So I measured 20 ml of jojoba oil in a measuring cup and put the cup in a pan with warm water on a stove top. I cut off a small piece of rose wax and added candelila wax until I had 3 grams total. My kitchen scale is not very precise, though, so I’m not too sure about the amount.

I added the wax to the now warm jojoba oil and watched it melt. I stirred it to make sure that it was mixed well.

Then I poured the liquid into the glass jar.

I let it cool down and voilà! Done.

I’ve used it and it feels quite similar to the original Ultrabalm. But even if it didn’t, it would be easy to melt it again and add some more of some of the ingredients to change the ratios.

And of course you could experiment a bit by using a different wax or oil. I like the smell of rose wax, but if you don’t, you could leave it out for a more neutral ointment. You could also add a drop of essential oil if you want a different smell. So many possibilities!