Flow — Oily Sensitive, a light face moisturiser for oily, sensitive skin

The lightest moisturiser in the range, made for skin that is both oily and easily upset. It pairs light, fast-absorbing cold-pressed oils with Atlantic algae and a prebiotic and postbiotic blend, kept deliberately simple and free of synthetic fragrance. Light enough for daily use under sunscreen or make-up.

Image brief: coast shot, the Flow bottle with its Oily Sensitive label.

At a glance

• Skin type: Oily Sensitive
• Texture: Flow, the lightest in the whole range. Around 11% cold-pressed organic oil.
• Best for: the face, and skin that wants hydration without heaviness or fuss
• Format: [size to supply] · [price to supply]
• Full formulation: published in full below

What it is, and who it's for

Oily and sensitive at the same time is an awkward pairing. The skin makes plenty of surface oil, yet reacts easily to many of the things commonly used to manage it. The sensible answer is to do less, not more. Flow Oily Sensitive is the lightest moisturiser we make, built to hydrate and support skin of this kind while keeping the formula deliberately simple, with no synthetic fragrance and only one carefully placed essential oil.

The blend leans on light, linoleic-rich grape seed and antioxidant-rich pomegranate, with a light dragon fruit seed oil and a modest note of conditioning argan. Alongside them sit squalane, soothing allantoin, our Atlantic algae, and a prebiotic and postbiotic pairing chosen to support the skin's own microbiome. Every one is listed below, with the exact amount.

As with any new product on reactive skin, it's worth patch testing before regular use.

For a richer texture on the body, this exists as a Core. For drier areas such as hands, elbows and feet, there is a Deep.

How to use

Smooth a small amount over clean skin once or twice a day, before sunscreen or make-up. A little is enough. For reactive skin, patch test first.

Image brief: a texture shot, the Flow on fingertips, showing how light it is.

Key ingredients

Six worth knowing. The full list is below. Each links to its ingredient page.

Grape Seed Oil — 2.52% A light, fast-absorbing oil high in linoleic acid, the essential fatty acid the skin draws on to keep its barrier in order, and a natural fit for oily and combination skin where a non-greasy finish matters. It also carries proanthocyanidins, a group of polyphenols the research credits with antioxidant activity, and cold-pressing keeps more of them intact.

Pomegranate Seed Oil — 2.52% An antioxidant-rich seed oil notable for punicic acid, an unusual fatty acid found in few other plants, along with tocopherols and polyphenols. The research points to antioxidant and possible soothing activity. We keep the story on the oil's chemistry, not the fruit's reputation.

Argan Kernel Oil — 1.26% A well-tolerated, medium-weight oil with a balanced profile of oleic and linoleic acids, natural vitamin E, and some unusual plant sterols. We keep it to a modest level here, as the conditioning note in a blend built to stay light. Argan attracts more marketing than almost any oil, so we stick to describing what it is rather than what it is said to do.

Squalane — 1% A lightweight, skin-identical oil, today derived from plants such as olive rather than the shark-derived squalane of the past. It absorbs cleanly without greasiness, which is exactly what an oily-skin moisturiser wants.

Atlantic Algae, Bladderwrack — 0.14% Our signature ingredient. Bladderwrack is the same Atlantic species, Fucus vesiculosus, that grows on the rocks below Welcombe, though the extract itself is produced in France from that species. It is rich in fucoidans and phlorotannins, and the research points to antioxidant activity. The Devon coast is the kinship here, not the source.

Prebiotic and Postbiotic — Inulin 0.5%, Barley Seed Ferment 1% Inulin is a prebiotic, a substrate that the research suggests can help support the skin's own beneficial microbes. The barley seed ferment is a postbiotic, the filtered products of fermentation rather than live cultures, studied for support of hydration and a settled skin surface. The skin evidence here is still developing, and we would rather say so than overstate it.

A light dragon fruit seed oil completes the blend at 2.10%. See the full list below.

Image brief: shared Oily Sensitive-family key-ingredient stills, including pomegranate and grape seed.

The full formulation

We publish every ingredient and the exact percentage we use.

At a glance: water phase around 81%, plant oils 10.9%, actives and texture 2.2%, olive-derived emulsifiers 5.3%. The low oil figure is what makes this the lightest in the range.

Cold-pressed organic where marked. Note: this column currently totals 99.46%, see the note at the top. Likely fix is Aqua at around 70.54%.

A note on what's in it, and what isn't

We never use synthetic fragrance, and we never use "parfum" as a catch-all on the label. The formula contains one essential oil, vetiver, here at 0.10%, the lowest level we use anywhere. We chose it on purpose: the research points to genuine benefits for the skin, and it carries none of the allergens that EU rules would require us to declare separately. It is on the label, as everything is, so you can see exactly how much is there. For skin that reacts easily, patch testing a new product first is always sensible.

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