Sweet Local Bodycare from Avital’s Apiaries

Bees perform a kind of alchemy, transforming pollen and nectar into sweet, sticky honey, beloved by cartoon bears and all of us with a sweet tooth. Lesli Sagan, owner of Avital’s Apiaries, is a bit of an alchemist herself, using beeswax, honey, and propolis to create natural bodycare products.

Avital’s Apiaries balms, soaps, and other body-care products are made using all-natural, often organic, and often locally sourced ingredients. Some ingredients are very locally sourced, coming right from her beehives.

Lesli’s love affair with bees — and she does love them — began about ten years ago.  “Bees are essentially wild — you give them good digs and they stay,” she explained. “Bees are a beautiful little society.” Everything bees make, it turns out, is great for human skin. We all know honey tastes great  and smells wonderful, but it’s also a humectant — it attracts moisture. This makes it a great  addition to soaps. Beeswax, used in skin and lip balms, seals in moisture. Propolis, an antimicrobial substance that bees make to use as a barrier to protect their hives from pests and disease, serves to kill bacteria.

Avital’s Apiaries soaps are vibrantly colored with spices and clays, and scented with essential oils. They contain only plant oils, and the oil content is high enough (in soap-makers’ parlance, the bars are “super-fatted”) that some is left over after the saponification process to moisturize the skin. The balms are made of natural oils and beeswax; because they contain no water, they need no preservatives. The deodorant employs propolis and essential oils to keep odor at bay. Other products include body scrubs, bath fizzies, lotion, and lip balm.

All the ingredients reflect a desire to keep not only the humans who use them healthy, but the bees, too. “As a beekeeper, I want everything to be good for the bees, good for nature, and good for us,” Lesli explained. With a consciousness that extends beyond ingredients, she chooses  reusable, recyclable, and biodegradable packaging wherever possible.

“I want to be a showcase for natural products that are simple and chic and lovely and just make you feel good,” she said. “I don’t make anything I wouldn’t use myself.”

Look for the full line of Avital’s Apiaries products in the Wellness Department at the West End store, and for a selection of soaps at the Collegetown store.