Dye
Ultramarine
blue / pink
INCI: CI 77007
origin: France
Description
CI 77007 is a blue dye of mineral origin compatible with organic cosmetics. This ingredient is one of the blue constituents of Lapis-Lazuli, a metamorphic rock, containing silicates of the feldspathoid group.
It is an originally very precious dye which is said to exceed the price of gold. Historically obtained by grinding the fine stone of lapis lazuli and among the most expensive of natural pigments, it was sent from quarries beyond the seas, in the East, hence its name “Ultramarine”.
Its synthesis by the French Jean-Baptiste Guimet in 1926 greatly democratized its price. The technique has since consisted in heating to several hundred degrees a mixture of clay, caustic soda (to provide sodium) and charcoal.