A Luxury Green Bio-Tech Skincare Brand Keeps Predicting Beauty’s Future

This month, luxury green bio-tech skincare brand, Orveda, opened its first standalone spa and wellness sanctuary on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. The prestigious Orveda Maison New York joins their destination in Shanghai and a soon-to-open Maison in Paris, where they offer signature facials like their Anti-Fatigue Skin Rehab, Glow Is The New Lift and Omni Solution for skin healing, luminosity, lift and contour.

Since its founding in 2014, the luxury vegan skincare brand has been available at retailers like Saks Fifth Avenue and offered spa treatments at chic destinations like The Sinner Hotel in Paris, France. But in a world that champions aggressive active ingredients and treatments, the establishment of their Maisons, or treatment destinations, represents an excitingluxury skincare offering that addresses skin-aging while rebuilding its integrity.

The brand’s expansion is a testament the business-savviness and skincare savoir-faire of its co-founders; but the most fascinating part of the brand’s success lies in the ingenuity of its trend-forecasting.

From its conception, Orveda’s visionary co-founder Sue Nabi—a longtime beauty industry CEO and the former president of L’Oréal and Lancome—always sought to differentiate the brand from the dermatological status quo. First, Nabi recognized consumers’ developing propensity to over-use harsh active ingredients in a way that was compromising the skin’s protective moisture barrier. This led to sensitized skin states that were prone to dehydration, reactivity and inflammation. Particularly when coupled with popular in-office treatments, these aggressive protocols exacerbated chronically sensitive complexions that were prone to prone to redness, textural irregularities and eruptions.

To remedy this, Nabi and her co-founder, CEO and businessman Nicholas Vu, worked with scientists and medical experts to formulate a line that prioritized skin barrier and microbiome health while also rigorously addressing its desired aesthetic. Rather than reaching for conventional go-to ingredients, they looked to the cutting-edge of science to draw upon green biotech actives that cater to sensitive, or sensitized, skin. Their formulating philosophy represents an alliance between the natural world and science, addressing anti-aging using a holistic approach while using a vegan roster of science-backed, bio-tech ingredients.

Nabi’s foresight into skincare’s future trajectory was spot-on, as proven by the contemporary skin trends that address the skinbarrier- and microbiome. Many consumers began to experience firsthand how barrier-compromised skin lacked glow, hydration and vitality, hence the rise of skin practices like “skin cycling” and slugging, as active ingredients like ceramides, lipids and pre- and probiotics surged. Some found themselves unable to use their former go-to actives—from vitamin C, to alpha and beta hydroxy acids, to retinol. One beauty editor developed chronic dermatitis after the severely drying AviClear laser degraded her skin barrier and resulted in microbiome dysbiosis.

It all comes down to the skin barrier and microbiome’s defensive roles for the skin, both locking moisture in and keeping pathogens and irritants out. From the start, Orveda’s collection featured gentle-yet-powerful formulations that were designed to heal and soothe the skin barrier while supporting the microbiome. Their decadent Orveda Eye Unveiler Cream, $320, contains specific ratios of ceramides and bio-identical lipids to optimally support and reconstitute the skin barrier. It also contains glow-inducing ingredients like prebiotics that support the microflora that make up microbiome—the glow-power of which is unrivaled in their Bio-Tech Emulsion, $390.

While addressing the root causes of sensitivity, they also opt for gentler bio-tech alternatives. Vitamin C is the most popular skincare antioxidant, but it can be irritating; Orveda’s antioxidants of choice come from biofermented forms of kombucha, marine enzymes and the potent bacteria found deep in the sea, Thermus Thermophilus. Experientially, the line has always stood out for replenishing and maintaining hydration while generating noticeable glow while addressing the concerns of aging.

But the brand has also evolved in fascinating ways that prove their commitment to innovation. Their most recent product to launch is the award-winning Omnipotent Concentrate, $520, which was one of the first skincare products in the mainstream beauty world to address a phenomenon called cellular senescence.

Simply put, cellular senescence is a state akin to a “cell purgatory” of sorts, wherein the cell is not dead, but it no longer divides or performs its functions. Often referred to as “zombie cells,” they are problematic because they signal to other cells to follow suit and stop dividing. This is one of the most recently identified bodily mechanisms that accelerates aging, and science and research-led skincare brands have begun to discuss ways to preserve cellular longevity—both topically and nutraceutically. True to form, Orveda was among the first to bring the term to the luxury skincare community.

On that note, yes—there is a high price tag associated with their rigorously research-driven approach to green biotechnology. This is also an incredibly niche approach given the immense saturation of the beauty market. That being said, data shows that research is one of the luxury skincare’s consumer’s top motivations when purchasing. Plus, Orveda’s concept was always inherently futuristic—forecasting the rise of sensitized skin and presenting a solution with a data-driven line—they just so happened to execute it ingeniously. After pre-dating the barrier and biome trends, they now continue to do so with emergent trends; avant-garde thinking is simply a part of their brand DNA.

Now, as Orveda unveils their global Maisons, their brand identity is being translated into physical spaces. Vu himself oversaw the minimalist design of the 3,840 square foot space in New York—the design of which intentionally juxtaposes old with new, minimalist with modern, in both its architectural design and decor. The brand’s green and black color schemes make a prominent statement throughout, as the choice of angular glass and earthy marble alludes to the brand’s multi-sensorial meeting points between nature and science.

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