Neem

A natural history

Neem is one of India's most useful trees, woven into daily life for thousands of years, with traces of its use reaching back to the ancient cities of the Indus Valley. Almost every part of the tree has a purpose, which is how it earned its enduring nickname, the village pharmacy. Its standing is not only folklore: in 1992 the United States National Academy of Sciences published a report titled Neem, A Tree for Solving Global Problems, and it is often called the tree of the twenty-first century.

Some of its traditional uses are wonderfully tangible. For generations people have cleaned their teeth with a frayed neem twig, the original natural toothbrush, and tucked the bitter leaves into beds, books, and grain stores to keep insects away. For the skin, neem leaf was crushed into a juice or paste and used to cool, cleanse, and calm troubled, itchy, or blemish-prone skin.

What it does for your skin

Neem leaf carries antioxidant and antimicrobial compounds, and modern reviews have looked at what these mean for skin. A 2021 review in Recent Advances in Anti-Infective Drug Discovery describes neem's antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidant activity in the context of skin, which helps explain its long use for clearer, more comfortable-looking skin.^[1] A 2022 review in the journal Cosmetics notes that neem's natural compounds have most often been explored for oily, blemish-prone, and reactive skin, while pointing out that cosmetic clinical data are still limited.^[2] That is why we pair neem's purifying nature with soothing oils, so it clarifies without stripping the skin barrier.

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