Dive into the world of revolutionary skincare with Guerlain’s latest innovation, the Abeille Royale Youth Watery Oil Serum. Celebrating a fusion of advanced science and the natural potency of bee products, this serum brings an unparalleled approach to anti-aging. Discover how rare black bee honeys and royal jelly, combined with cutting-edge mesenchymal stromal cell (MSC) research, are transforming skincare. We sit down with Guerlain’s Scientific Communication Director, Dr. Bonte, to explore the magic behind the serum, its eco-conscious formulation, and its promise to redefine youthful radiance. —Vita Daily
You mentioned recent scientific advances that inspired this serum. Could you explain what they involve and how they contributed to improving the formula?
Research on skin aging reveals that around the age of 25 to 30, skin cells begin to function less efficiently, and their natural repair and defense mechanisms slow down or weaken. Poorly repaired skin ages faster. Daily exposure to stress accumulates over time, leading to the formation of micro-tears or micro-lesions that are invisible to the naked eye. These factors directly impact tissue firmness, accelerate the appearance of wrinkles, and reduce skin radiance. Our research, along with a recent partnership with a laboratory specializing in rejuvenation, has enabled us to better understand and target new biological pathways involved in skin regeneration.
The Abeille Royale range is specifically designed to enhance the skin’s self-repairing abilities, leveraging the exceptional benefits of bee products—honey and royal jelly. The advances behind this new serum rely on a novel combination of three types of honey, all sourced from black bees, along with royal jelly, incorporated into an innovative formula. This uniquely sensorial formula is designed to deliver immediate and progressive reparative cosmetic action within the skin by controlling its fusion with the skin’s superficial layers. Its texture, hydrating, balancing, and film-forming was developed in collaboration with physical chemists specializing in rheology and vectorization. Their goal was to create a product that delivers an exceptional sensory experience while offering powerful, deep-acting cosmetic benefits.
How did Guerlain Research select its honeys? Why is Ouessant honey so special in the Abeille Royale range?
Abeille Royale is a skincare range focused on skin repair, born from the fusion of Science and Bees. Our search for honeys with cosmetic benefits is deeply connected to the latest findings from our research on the biological repair processes of aging skin.
For over 15 years, we have developed a multi-parameter selection process to identify honeys with increasingly powerful repair activities. To properly select the right honeys, we analyze their composition, test their biological activities, and choose the most effective ones—keeping in mind that only a limited number of honeys possess reparative properties.
This selection process combines the study of honey-producing bee species in relation to the purity, uniqueness, and diversity of their environment (flora, microclimate, soil), the analysis of the complex composition of honey, and the evaluation of its reparative properties using increasingly innovative in vitro and ex vivo study models.
This approach led us to select the production of a resilient bee species, the black bee (Apis mellifera mellifera), native to Western Europe. Living in isolated, unique ecosystems, these bees produce honeys with complex compositions capable of acting on biological targets involved in skin repair and beauty.
In particular, we have chosen Ouessant Island honey (France) as a cornerstone of our technologies for many years due to its unique composition of polyphenols, amino acids, vitamins, and trace elements. These families of molecules play a crucial role in maintaining the skin’s quality and repair capacity, preserving its youthful appearance. This honey has also demonstrated significant activity on epidermal and dermal biological targets. In the new technology of our Serum, it is for the first time combined with royal jelly from our exclusive sources and two other black bee honeys, one from Ireland and the other from Norway. The plants pollinated by these local black bees are very different, which explains why these honeys, carefully selected for their properties and biological activity signatures, have unique compositions.
What role do these three honeys and royal jelly play in skin repair?
It’s not just the individual properties of these ingredients that matter, but the synergy of the unique combination of the three honeys and royal jelly—renowned for its unparalleled potency. In vitro tests on cultured human skin cells have demonstrated their effectiveness on both epidermal and dermal targets crucial for skin repair. At the epidermal level, this combination stimulates the production of three essential components: cytokeratin-10, involucrin, and corneodesmosin. At the dermal level, it enhances the synthesis of collagen, hyaluronic acid, and elastin—key elements for maintaining firm and youthful-looking skin. Additionally, this combination regulates the enzyme matrix metalloproteinase-2, which, in aged or stressed skin, degrades structural proteins in the dermis.
Royal jelly is a concentrate of activity and energy, as it is rich in carbohydrates, including fast-acting sugars like glucose and slower-acting ones like fructose, as well as lipids, proteins, and vitamins B3 and B5.
Moreover, these bee products selected by Guerlain have been tested for the first time on a new type of cell: mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs). These cells are responsible for activating the fundamental mechanisms of skin repair.
The oil-in-water texture is ultra-light and penetrates deeply. Why is this texture so important for the serum’s effectiveness?
A serum must deliver cosmetic benefits that are immediate, progressive, and tangible, which we have demonstrated. Our new formula contains a novel combination of four glycols, adenosine, a vitamin C derivative, and beads made of a propolis oleo-extract and a radiance-boosting complex. This new formula has proven effectiveness demonstrated by clinical and instrumental studies, as well as being perceived and appreciated through consumer tests.
In one month, the skin becomes firmer and more radiant. What in the formula ensures these lasting results?
It all comes down to Guerlain’s expertise in formulation, which, since its inception in 1828, has innovated by combining scientific discoveries from various fields (chemistry, pharmacy, extraction, analysis, etc.) with natural, effective ingredients known for their proven biological activities. In this new serum, this philosophy of “formula construction” is reflected in the careful combination of glycols, polymers, texturizing agents, triglyceride derivatives, microcrystalline cellulose derivatives, and pigments, all working together to deliver the potent effects of our bee-derived ingredients, whose biological benefits have been demonstrated in vitro.
Our formula strikes a delicate balance of ingredients that provides immediate cosmetic effects upon application (plumping, correcting, radiance-boosting, sensory experience) while also delivering deeper, longer-lasting benefits (firming, smoothing, hydrating).
The serum contains 99% natural ingredients. How have you managed to combine anti-aging efficacy with this commitment to naturalness?
This challenge of naturalness was part of the initial brief for our formulators, which led to a stringent selection process and a deep understanding of our ingredients shared across all research and development teams. For years, Guerlain has been a pioneer and highly committed, collaborating with its suppliers and partners in the search for bio-sourced materials that meet the criteria of the ISO16128 standard, which calculates the percentage of naturality in a formula.
Guerlain combines nature and science in its products. How has this approach evolved with 15 years of research on Abeille Royale?
Abeille Royale is a line focused on skin repair, born from Science and the Bee. To strengthen our scientific research, we created Beelab™, a unique international research platform. It brings together experts on bees, their ecosystems, complex honey analysis, and biologists specializing in healthy human skin. As part of Beelab Guerlain™, we have analyzed over 300 honey samples from around the world. This extensive analysis has enabled us to create identity profiles for each honey. We gain access to various details such as: bee species, precise geographic origin, the plants they pollinate, environmental type, and molecular composition. This new knowledge plays an essential role in the selection process for our researchers to choose the most suitable products to meet the skincare objectives of our Abeille Royale line.
For years, we have closely collaborated with scientific partners specializing in skin aging and its self-repair mechanisms. It all began with our intuition of a parallel between wound healing processes and skin repair mechanisms, which was later reinforced by a meeting with a French surgeon, Professor Descottes, who had been successfully using honey-based dressings for 25 years in hospitals to treat stubborn wounds. This led us to work with Professor Alexis Desmoulière from the Faculty of Pharmacy in Limoges, an expert in wound healing mechanisms, to study the connections between nerve cells and skin cells (“neuro-inflam’aging”), as well as to develop models for testing the reparative properties of Guerlain’s honey and royal jelly. Three years ago, we initiated a new partnership with Restore, a French research center specializing in rejuvenation and stromal cells in regenerative medicine.
We work on the efficacy and desirability of our formulas with physicochemists and experienced formulators who develop innovative, balanced textures that are proven to be effective, sensorily appealing, and with fragrances created by our perfumers.
The cosmetic efficacy of our formulas is measured and validated through studies conducted by experts from independent centers, which include instrumental tests, clinical evaluations, and consumer trials. For the past four years, Abeille Royale has been the best-selling anti-aging skincare line in selective distribution in France.
Abeille Royale is today: 15 years of research on the reparative powers of honey, 9 patents, and 9 scientific publications.
What does the new deep repair technology bring that is different in the Youth Serum compared to previous products?
For the first time, a new biological target at the core of skin repair has been identified through a new partnership with the Restore laboratory: mesenchymal stromal cells (MSCs).
MSCs are present in connective tissues beneath the epithelium or between functional cells, deep within the skin. They are essential in self-repair processes, particularly when under stress or in a state of senescence, as they lose their vitality, mobility, and much of their reparative capacity. By testing for the first time on these cells a unique blend of 3 black bee honeys and royal jelly, Abeille Royale has developed a new deep repair technology.
As we age, MSCs become less effective. How does the new serum help these cells function better to repair the skin?
It has been demonstrated in vitro by a partner team from the Restore laboratory at the University of Toulouse that, among several ingredients tested “blindly,” our new blend of black bee honeys and royal jelly used in this new serum is capable of revitalizing stressed and senescent stromal cells by +339%.
The Youth Serum helps stimulate the production of important proteins like cytokeratin and involucrin. What is their role in the resistance and strength of the skin?
These are crucial proteins for the structure of the stratum corneum and its barrier role: this natural protective barrier prevents skin dehydration and the penetration of particles, bacteria, viruses, and more… Without this barrier, life on Earth would not be possible. Cytokeratin 10 is key for the skin’s resistance to external mechanical stress, while involucrin is a component of the envelope of corneocytes, the so-called “dead” cells on the outermost layer of the skin, which are packed with ultra-resistant keratins. We should not forget corneodesmosine, which strengthens the cohesion of the stratum corneum, thus its resistance and solidity, both essential to the skin’s barrier function.
Guerlain conducted an extensive testing plan on 530 subjects. Does this mean the serum is effective for everyone?
This serum was evaluated on women and men with healthy skin of different origins, ages, and skin types, including those with “sensitive” skin. The 530 subjects who participated in the tests were divided into 216 for instrumental measurements, 96 for clinical tests under dermatological control, and 218 for consumer tests. It is important to note that the results of all these tests are processed and validated by biostatisticians.
Our serum is a cosmetic product, so its application can be recommended from the age of 25-30, either for prevention or as a treatment, once the first visible signs of aging appear.
Can you explain the “1-1-1 feat” and how Guerlain achieves visible results from the very first drops, after 1 hour, and after 1 month of use?
In addition to testing on 530 cumulative subjects, we also measured the serum’s effectiveness over several timeframes to ensure visible improvements in skin youthfulness and quality both immediately and in the long term.
Immediately, a strengthening of the skin barrier is measured.
After just 1 hour, it is proven that the skin appears rejuvenated, with a 25% reduction in wrinkles and a 124% increase in hydration (instrumental measurements).
After 1 month, the panel assessed a 53% increase in firmness and a 60% increase in radiance. Finally, through a persistence test conducted after a week without the product, we observed that the repair of age signs is maintained over time.
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