Rachel Pachivas

Formulator, Salt+Blue & Annmarie Skin Care · CEO, Annmarie Skin Care

Rachel Pachivas is the formulator behind Salt+Blue and Annmarie Skin Care, and the CEO of Annmarie Skin Care. She develops the formulas both brands are built on — including the Salt+Blue mineral sunscreen.

Rachel is self-taught, with fifteen years of guidance from a formulator with more than forty-five years of experience. It started about twenty years ago, with a stretch of traveling in Australia and living briefly with a naturopath — which got her playing with herbs and natural ingredients and making her own simple products at home. She has been formulating ever since.

Her work centers on a constraint most of the industry treats as optional: keeping an ingredient list short enough that every item on it is doing something for the skin, rather than managing the consequences of something else being on the list.

The Salt+Blue body sunscreen is the clearest expression of that. She developed it from the base up and went anhydrous — no water at all — on purpose. No water means fewer ingredients: no preservative system, no stabilizers, no solubilizers. What's left is a base of plant oils and butters carrying non-nano zinc oxide, as pure and simple as she could make it. Because the formula ends up in the ocean, being friendly to it was a design goal from the start, and not something she takes lightly.

The through-line of her work is a belief that we should all have a say in what goes into and onto our bodies — pure food, clean water, and non-toxic skincare and medicine alike. Her favorite parts of the job are ingredient research, formulation, sustainability work, and pushing for better education on organics and chemicals in the industry.

In her spare time, Rachel might be gardening, botanical plant dyeing, blending essential oils, playing in the yard with her little one, or relaxing outside in a hammock. She's also the one you'll see rubbing the sunscreen in in the brand's how-to video.