Ingredient

Wakame Seaweed Powder

Undaria pinnatifida

Bathe in seaweeds and benefit from their minerals. They’re soothing, they're softening, they’re good friends to your skin.

What is wakame seaweed?

Undaria pinnatifida, commonly called wakame or Japanese seaweed, belongs to the kelp family. The algae of this family have in common their ability to grow long stems anchored to the seabed, more or less high depending on the species. They create underwater forests, home to a lot of marine life. They are very nutritious but not always edible - wakame is!

Although wakame is native to the coasts of the northwest Pacific Ocean, it now grows in many parts of the world as long as the water temperature is right (between 6 and 14°C). They are still mainly used commercially and culinary by the Japanese and Koreans, who have been farming and consuming these seaweeds for centuries. You heard right, ocean farming is a thing!

Where do we get it?

Lush UK and Japan purchase this seaweed powder from a producer in Kesennuma, a city in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. This area was extremely affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, and Kesennuma was partially destroyed.

Our supplier is part of the Sanriku seaweed aquaculture business. This network of local producers supplies 70% of Japanese wakame production. Unfortunately, most of their factories were destroyed by the earthquake as well as their refrigerators. Only one of these storage places made it through… and it contained wakame seaweed! It took the joint effort of directors and employees to clean up what was left of their facilities and get them working again.

With seven manufacturing sites across the globe, this information may vary depending on where your Lush products were made.