The Guardian Shrub

I still have the lab notebook. Page 47 lists 14 code-named extracts—“Climber,” “Nightshade,” “Root 9,” etc.  After 48 hours of  rigorous testing, every sample stained the film amber save for one: Buddleja, the butterfly bush.

That lone dish stayed almost clear throughout testing—proof a shrub grown for extremes like salty air, full sun, and blustery cold just might be the bodyguard our hand formula had been waiting for. The draw for me when our chemist put it forth?  A phenyl-propanoid called verbascoside, a molecule with documented antioxidant and photo-protective properties. (Yes, we absolutely are maniacal about our ingredients and formulas).

Can a flowering plant protect your hands from aging? 

This is why we chose it. Your hands show age first.  Buddleja calms inflammation, supports elasticity and helps restore the skin barrier, targeting damage hands endure most: washing, UV and exposure.  

Considered invasive on some continents, Buddleja grows easily, attracting butterflies, bees, and moths to its vivid blooms. I have it in my garden on Martha’s Vineyard—leggy, a little wild, with lilac-like flowers. In bloom, they smell faintly of honeyed lychee; in the lab, that scent disappears.

But its scent doesn’t even scratch the surface of this remarkable plant’s impact on our skin and keeping your hands soft when you wash them a dozen times a day. So if you’re looking for a way to protect your hands naturally, this is where to start. 

It has been clinically proven to protect against UVA damage and it prevents collagen from degrading. It’s useful for prematurely aging or environmental stress affected skin, and can even be helpful for skin firming, strengthening peptide bonds on the surface. Victorian nurseries sold Buddleja as “summer lilac” and after the Blitz it became known  as London’s “bomb-site bush,” greening destroyed terrain. Survival and hardiness is the through-line—exactly the grit we bottle for our Open Garden and First Edition Hand and Body washes and creams. 

I still go back to that lab page. The thing about science and nature is that no matter how much we know, there’s always more to learn. That’s why we test obsessively and stay curious. Nature still holds secrets.

Fortunately, page 47 still rings true, and we give thanks every day to the simple, miraculous Butterfly Bush.