Luxury Scalp Care: How to Look After Your Scalp With an Oil and a Scrub

What is the best luxury scalp serum? Not a serum. The scalp is skin, and what it needs is what facial skin needs: a cleanse that does not strip it, an occasional exfoliation, and a conditioning oil. Opuliss does not make a scalp serum. It makes a rosemary and peppermint scalp oil, a weekly clay scrub and a gentle shampoo.

This page is about the scalp, the skin under the hair. It says what each product does to that skin, cites the study behind each ingredient, and makes no claim about the hair itself, because none of the studies below were run on hair.

What scalp care actually is

The scalp has the same layers as the skin on your face, with more oil glands per square centimetre and a covering of hair that traps sebum, product residue and dead surface cells against it. Scalp care is the same three jobs as facial skincare, done with textures that work through hair: cleanse without stripping, exfoliate now and then so residue does not build up, and condition the skin so it does not feel tight or dry.

The ingredients that do those jobs are ordinary ones with published safety reviews. Kaolin is a mineral clay assessed as safe by the Cosmetic Ingredient Review panel,¹ and it adsorbs oil and residue while it sits on the skin. Rosemary leaf carries carnosic acid, a phenolic diterpene with laboratory evidence in skin cells. Peppermint carries menthol, which is the cooling feeling. Argan, castor, hemp and avocado oils are plant emollients that soften and condition.

How it works

The scrub works mechanically and by adsorption. Kaolin adsorbs sebum and surface residue during the minute it is massaged in,¹ and micronised sour cherry shell powder polishes the surface so dead cells lift away with the rinse. Peppermint oil and menthol give the cooling tingle: menthol activates the cold-sensing receptor in skin, so the skin reports cold without any change in temperature.³ The tingle is a sensation, not a sign that anything is happening underneath, and the page says so.

The oil works by conditioning. Its base is castor, argan, hemp and avocado oils, plant emollients that soften the skin and leave a light protective layer. In a two month study, argan oil applied to the skin improved elasticity readings.⁴ Rosemary leaf oil adds carnosic acid, which in a laboratory study on human skin cells reduced the rise in collagen-degrading enzymes that ultraviolet light triggers.² On a scalp page that is antioxidant conditioning of the skin, and nothing more is claimed for it. Nettle leaf extract and peppermint round out the blend.

The shampoo works by cleansing gently. Hydrolysed wheat protein forms a light conditioning film on skin and hair. The Cosmetic Ingredient Review panel assessed it as safe as used, with an advisory that people with a wheat allergy should patch test first,⁵ and that advisory is repeated on the product page. Plum fruit extract, linden flower extract and jasmine flower extract sit in the formula for skin that reacts easily.

What the evidence shows and does not

What it shows: safety reviews for kaolin and hydrolysed wheat protein, a laboratory mechanism for carnosic acid in skin cells, the receptor that explains menthol's cooling, and one human study of argan oil on skin elasticity.

What it does not show: none of these studies were run on the scalp, and none were run on these products. The argan oil study measured facial skin, and the carnosic acid work was done in cells, not on people. There is no trial of any of these products on hair, and this page makes no claim about hair at all. What you can expect is what the mechanisms support: a cleaner-feeling scalp, less residue, a cooling sensation from the scrub and the oil, and skin that feels less tight and dry.

Two disclosures belong here rather than in the small print. The scrub contains hydrolysed keratin from sheep wool, so it is not vegan, while the oil and the shampoo are. And both the scrub and the oil carry fragrance allergens that European law requires on the label, including menthol, limonene, linalool and camphor, so patch test on the inner forearm for 24 hours before the first use. Our standard for every page is the one in how to tell if a luxury skincare brand is actually science-backed.

The Opuliss products that use it

The routine has three steps and they run in this order. Once a week, on a wet scalp, massage a small amount of the ROSEMARY MINT SCALP SCRUB in with the fingertips for 30 to 60 seconds, working through the scalp and not the lengths, then rinse. It is a 170 ml weekly exfoliating scrub built on kaolin and sour cherry shell powder with peppermint and rosemary leaf oil, 99 percent natural origin.

Then cleanse with the SOOTHING SCALP SHAMPOO, a 400 ml gentle shampoo built on hydrolysed wheat protein, plum, linden and jasmine extracts, 98 percent natural origin and vegan eligible, composed for a scalp that reacts easily.

Daily, or on the days between washes, apply 4 to 8 drops of the ROSEMARY MINT SCALP OIL to the scalp and massage for a minute or two. Leave it in, or apply it 30 to 60 minutes before shampooing as a pre-wash soak. It is a 30 ml six-oil blend of castor, argan, hemp, avocado, rosemary leaf and nettle with peppermint, 100 percent natural origin and vegan eligible.

The kaolin glossary entry, the argan oil entry and the peppermint entry carry each ingredient's listing, and the full ingredient library covers the rest of the blend.

Frequently Asked Questions

References

1. Elmore AR, Cosmetic Ingredient Review Expert Panel. Final report on the safety assessment of aluminum silicate, calcium silicate, magnesium aluminum silicate, magnesium silicate, magnesium trisilicate, sodium magnesium silicate, zirconium silicate, attapulgite, bentonite, Fuller's earth, hectorite, kaolin, lithium magnesium silicate, lithium magnesium sodium silicate, montmorillonite, pyrophyllite, and zeolite. Int J Toxicol. 2003;22 Suppl 1:37-102. PubMed PMID 12851164 (Elmore 2003).
2. Park M, Han J, Lee CS, et al. Carnosic acid, a phenolic diterpene from rosemary, prevents UV-induced expression of matrix metalloproteinases in human skin fibroblasts and keratinocytes. Exp Dermatol. 2013;22(5):336-341. DOI 10.1111/exd.12138. PubMed PMID 23614740 (Park 2013).
3. Peier AM, Moqrich A, Hergarden AC, et al. A TRP channel that senses cold stimuli and menthol. Cell. 2002;108(5):705-715. DOI 10.1016/s0092-8674(02)00652-9. PubMed PMID 11893340 (Peier 2002).
4. Boucetta KQ, Charrouf Z, Aguenaou H, et al. The effect of dietary and/or cosmetic argan oil on postmenopausal skin elasticity. Clin Interv Aging. 2015;10:339-349. DOI 10.2147/CIA.S71684. PubMed PMID 25673976 (Boucetta 2015).
5. Burnett C, Bergfeld WF, Belsito DV, et al. Safety Assessment of Hydrolyzed Wheat Protein and Hydrolyzed Wheat Gluten as Used in Cosmetics. Int J Toxicol. 2018;37(1_suppl):55S-66S. DOI 10.1177/1091581818776013. PubMed PMID 29761728 (Burnett 2018).