Formula · psychodermatology
We don’t formulate skincare. We formulate capacity.
A selfmade formula starts with a capacity we’re building — secure attachment, resilience, intimacy — and the chemistry is chosen to serve it. Ingredients are the means, not the headline. Your skin isn’t just a surface; it runs its own stress hormones — keratinocytes carry the major components of the HPA axis, so the skin acts as an endocrine organ. (Leis K et al. (2019). Endocrine systems of the skin. Postępy Dermatologii i Alergologii XXXVI(5):519. “The skin also has a hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis homolog. A corticotropin-releasing hormone is produced and reacts with its skin receptors.” — https://doi.org/10.5114/ada.2019.89502) We formulate to work with that system, not against it.
What the formula builds
Three capacities. One practice.
Attachment
A secure relationship with yourself.
“The first relationship is with yourself. The longest relationship you’re going to have is with yourself.”
Secure Attachment Comfort Serum+ · Corrective Experience Comfort Cream
Resilience
The capacity to get back up.
“Resilience is when you get knocked down, how do you get back up and continue taking a bet on yourself.”
Rumination Recovery Balm
Intimacy
The capacity to be close — to yourself, then others.
“Into me, you see.”
Self Disclosure Intimacy Serum
The chemistry · ingredients
The ingredients are how the capacity gets built.
Three families, each meeting your skin’s stress system at a different point.One at a time →
Foundation + Repair· 01 / 03
Medicinal Botanicals
Nourish, repair, and protect with powerful plant bioactives.
Plant bioactives are biochemically intelligent — they evolved compounds to survive UV, pathogens, and oxidative stress, and they bring that to your barrier. We honour the whole plant, instead of always being so fractionated.
Stress-Resilience Building· 02 / 03
Adaptogens
Help skin adapt to stress, balance cortisol, and boost resilience.
Adaptogens don’t act on one pathway — they act in a multi-pathway, multi-target network, working on the skin’s own HPA axis to calm inflammation and restore the barrier.
Real-Time Stress Response· 03 / 03
Neuroactive Complexes
Regulate stress signals, calm inflammation, and strengthen the skin barrier.
The skin talks to the brain through its nerves. Neuroactives meet that conversation — modulating stress signals where the cortisol-inflammation loop actually starts.
“Back when you’re forming the embryo, the skin and the nervous system come out of the same layer. The ectoderm.”
The receipts.
A representative slice of the 22 peer-reviewed papers our formulas trace to, plus five years of advisor sessions on the record. Per-product testing details live on each product page.
- 1.Choe SJ et al. (2018). Psychological stress deteriorates skin barrier function by activating the HPA axis in skin. Scientific Reports 8:6334.“Increased cortisol inhibits the differentiation of keratinocytes and decreases the expression of cytokines needed to maintain the barrier function.”link ↗
- 2.Liu X-X et al. (2023). Bibliometric study of adaptogens in dermatology: pharmacophylogeny, phytochemistry, and pharmacological mechanisms. Drug Design, Development and Therapy 17:341.“A regulatory mechanism similar to the central HPA axis exists in the skin.”link ↗
- 3.Roosterman D et al. (2006). Neuronal control of skin function: the skin as a neuroimmunoendocrine organ. Physiological Reviews 86:1309.“The skin 'talks' to the brain via primary afferents thereby revealing information about the status of peripherally derived pain, pruritus, and local inflammation.”link ↗
- 4.Leis K et al. (2019). Endocrine systems of the skin. Postępy Dermatologii i Alergologii XXXVI(5):519.“The skin also has a hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis homolog. A corticotropin-releasing hormone is produced and reacts with its skin receptors.”link ↗
- 5.Graubard R, Perez-Sanchez A, Katta R (2021). Stress and skin: an overview of mind body therapies as a treatment in dermatology. Dermatology Practical & Conceptual 11(4):e2021091.“The skin acts not only as a physical barrier to the external environment, it may outwardly express the manifestations of internal processes.”link ↗
- 6.Tamir DI, Mitchell JP (2012). Disclosing information about the self is intrinsically rewarding. PNAS 109(21):8038.“Individuals were willing to forgo money to disclose about the self.”link ↗
- 7.Dreisoerner A et al. (2021). Self-soothing touch and being hugged reduce cortisol responses to stress. Comprehensive Psychoneuroendocrinology 8:100091.“Cortisol levels in both touch conditions were significantly lower in comparison to the control condition for three out of four measurement occasions following the stress test.”link ↗
- 8.Mu Y (2023). Interoception and emotional self-awareness — a review. International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities.“The better internal signals individuals perceive, the more intense emotional they can experience.”
Frequently asked.
- What is psychodermatology?
- Psychodermatology studies the connection between the skin, the nervous system, and emotional state. It treats skin as part of the body’s stress-response system, not just a surface.
- What do you mean by “formula”?
- A selfmade formula is two things at once: a capacity we’re building — secure attachment, resilience, intimacy — and the chemistry chosen to serve it. The ingredients are the means; the capacity is the point.
- What’s the science behind selfmade?
- Our formulas trace to 22 peer-reviewed papers and five years of sessions with named mental-health and formulation experts. A representative reference list is below; per-product testing details live on each product page.
- What is interoception?
- The body’s internal awareness — the sense of what’s happening inside you. Our rituals are built to enhance it, and research links interoception to emotional regulation and mental wellbeing.
A capacity, built — one ritual at a time.
See the formulas