Fragrance-free products:
You can save time and money by easily making your own personal care and cleaning products. You may want to try these recipes, leaving out fragranced essential oils. You'll be surprised at how fast, inexpensive and quick these are! Many more homemade recipes are on the web.
To help lessen the heavy fragrance from laundry products in clothing (purchased from a consignment shop, for instance), try washing it with castile soap. Fragrance chemicals last longer in synthetic fabrics than natural fabrics like cotton, so it may take a few tries.
Unscented product suggestions:
Below are products that have worked well for me and for friends and readers with fragrance issues. These are not endorsements of these products, but we've found them useful so far. You might too.
Laundry detergent -
Household cleaning - White vinegar mixed with water can work well for general cleaning. Baking soda works well for scrubbing household surfaces clean. Baking soda and white vinegar together will have a fizzy reaction. Hydrogen peroxide helps with disinfecting and cleaning. Borax is great for scrubbing toilets; follow the directions on the box.
Facial soap - Unscented glycerine soaps or goat's-milk soaps are mild and won't dry skin. Find these at your local farmer's market or a natural food store, or order online. Sometimes these can also be used in the shower as shampoo.
Hand soap -
Hand wipes and hand sanitizer -
Shampoo -
Facial moisturizer -
Moisturizer - Eucerin, Aveeno and Lubriderm make fragrance-free moisturizing lotions. For hands: Neutrogena's Norwegian Formula Fragrance-free Hand Cream or Eucerin's Intensive Repair Extra-enriched Hand Creme works well.
Cosmetics - Many homemade makeup websites, such as this one, recommend cornstarch or arrowroot powder as a face powder, tinted with cocoa powder if wanted. Sephora, Almay's Wake Up products, Bert's Bees Lip Shimmer, and Sue Devitt lipstick can have little scent.
Insect repellent - Many repellents with Picaridin are relatively unscented but effective. Sawyer's, Repel, Cutter's and Natrapel make repellents with Picaridin, and can be ordered online or found with some difficulty in stores.
Deodorant and antiperspirant - Dust with baking soda and/or corn starch instead.
Dishwashing liquid: Many major commercial companies and store brands now offer fragrance-free options.
Hair color: Redken's oil-based Chromatics line has little irritating scent.
Room freshener: Instead of spraying lung-irritating "air freshener" chemicals that add to indoor air pollution, try these easy solutions:
I'll add to this list as we discover other items that work well.
Updated December 2022
You can save time and money by easily making your own personal care and cleaning products. You may want to try these recipes, leaving out fragranced essential oils. You'll be surprised at how fast, inexpensive and quick these are! Many more homemade recipes are on the web.
- Binghamton University Sustainability: Recipes
- About.com: Liquid Hand Soap Recipe
- If you do use scented cleaning products, read these precautions in this article from Allergic Living magazine: "The Dirt on Cleaning."
To help lessen the heavy fragrance from laundry products in clothing (purchased from a consignment shop, for instance), try washing it with castile soap. Fragrance chemicals last longer in synthetic fabrics than natural fabrics like cotton, so it may take a few tries.
Unscented product suggestions:
Below are products that have worked well for me and for friends and readers with fragrance issues. These are not endorsements of these products, but we've found them useful so far. You might too.
Laundry detergent -
- I've been using just baking soda: a couple of tablespoons dissolved in hot water, per load of laundry. Or, use a cup of white vinegar instead. They each seem to clean laundry fine. The machine's agitation process does most of the work.
- Consumer advocate Clark Howard offers this recipe:DIY Laundry Detergent: Steps to Save on This Household Item (clark.com).
- Or, try a version of the Binghamton University recipe on the Unscented Alternatives page, but you may want to use much less than they recommend:
- They suggest mixing together equal parts of baking soda and washing soda (available at Walmart and many grocery stores) in a container with a lid. (Best to do this outside because the powder can poof into the air.)
- For each load, put about 1-2 teaspoons in a cup of hot tap water, stir it to dissolve the soap and pour it into the washing machine. It seems to clean clothes nicely in a cold water wash.
- White vinegar can be used as a rinse to dissolve any leftover baking soda.
- If you don't want to make your own, most major commercial detergent brands now come fragrance-free. Sometimes they're labeled "free and clear" or "for sensitive skin."
Household cleaning - White vinegar mixed with water can work well for general cleaning. Baking soda works well for scrubbing household surfaces clean. Baking soda and white vinegar together will have a fizzy reaction. Hydrogen peroxide helps with disinfecting and cleaning. Borax is great for scrubbing toilets; follow the directions on the box.
Facial soap - Unscented glycerine soaps or goat's-milk soaps are mild and won't dry skin. Find these at your local farmer's market or a natural food store, or order online. Sometimes these can also be used in the shower as shampoo.
Hand soap -
- Fragrance-free glycerine soap cleans without drying out skin.
- To make liquid hand soap, you can use the recipes in the link above, but use glycerine soap bars. Each bar costs perhaps two or three dollars a bar, the cost per cup of soap averages to be about 50-70 cents. Several brands make unscented liquid hand soap in dispensers, but they cost about $5 each.
- You can also try diluting fragrance-free castile soap, such as Dr. Bronner's, available in many stores.
- Away from home:
- You may want to carry a small container filled with baking soda. If a restaurant or business only has heavily-fragranced soap in the washroom, you can shake some baking soda onto your hands and scrub with that before rinsing well.
- You can also shave off sections of glycerine soap to keep in a small container to use while traveling.
- Fragrance-free hand sanitizer can be purchased or made with rubbing alcohol; look online for recipes.
Hand wipes and hand sanitizer -
- Small packets of alcohol wipes can clean hands if no unscented soap and water are available. Find those in any drugstore. They can be drying if used frequently, however, some people find the smell irritating.
- At a natural foods store, a friend discovered All Terrain Hand Sanz Fragrance Free Antiseptic Hand Sanitizer, which uses ethyl alcohol as the active ingredient.
- One reader suggested hypoallergenic baby wipes. They're mostly water, free of fragrance and alcohol, and found in major department stores in the baby care area. One brand is Water Wipes.
Shampoo -
- Unscented castile soap (Dr. Bronner's is one such brand) and fragrance-free shampoos are now widely available in stores, sometimes in the organic/natural or baby products aisles. Among the brands are Desert Essence and Whole Foods' 365 Everyday Value.
- My hairstylist reports that just baking soda can be used as shampoo - just sprinkle it onto wet hair, or make a paste with water and rub it into hair. Rinsing with red or cider vinegar can rinse out any leftover baking soda.
Facial moisturizer -
- Cetaphil makes a fragrance-free Daily Facial Moisturizer that is also SPF 15 (about $10); Walmart has a similar fragrance-free moisturizer.
Moisturizer - Eucerin, Aveeno and Lubriderm make fragrance-free moisturizing lotions. For hands: Neutrogena's Norwegian Formula Fragrance-free Hand Cream or Eucerin's Intensive Repair Extra-enriched Hand Creme works well.
Cosmetics - Many homemade makeup websites, such as this one, recommend cornstarch or arrowroot powder as a face powder, tinted with cocoa powder if wanted. Sephora, Almay's Wake Up products, Bert's Bees Lip Shimmer, and Sue Devitt lipstick can have little scent.
Insect repellent - Many repellents with Picaridin are relatively unscented but effective. Sawyer's, Repel, Cutter's and Natrapel make repellents with Picaridin, and can be ordered online or found with some difficulty in stores.
Deodorant and antiperspirant - Dust with baking soda and/or corn starch instead.
Dishwashing liquid: Many major commercial companies and store brands now offer fragrance-free options.
Hair color: Redken's oil-based Chromatics line has little irritating scent.
Room freshener: Instead of spraying lung-irritating "air freshener" chemicals that add to indoor air pollution, try these easy solutions:
- Put white vinegar in a spray bottle and spritz to remove odors from the air.
- Open a window for a few minutes to freshen the air.
- Leave a box of baking soda open in a room.
- Research shows that common indoor plants such as Golden Pothos, Weeping Fig and Peace Lily help to remove fragrance chemicals (formaldehyde, benzene, and others) from the air:
I'll add to this list as we discover other items that work well.
Updated December 2022