We all love hearing about a new for-benefit company, where a business has built its concept around benefitting a social cause. Most for-benefits are based in Africa or other impoverished countries, which is completely awesome — but there’s something especially impactful about hearing about one in my own country. It hits closer to home, literally.

Thistle Farms is a bath & beauty company based in Nashville, Tenn., that sells products handmade by women recovering from lives of prostitution, addiction and violence. It’s the social enterprise of the Magdalene project, and on average, women in the project range from the age of 20 to 50, were sexually abused as pre-teens, started using alcohol or drugs by their teens, have been arrested an average of 100 times and have spent about 12 years on the street prostituting.

In America.

The Magdalene program offers women two years of basic needs and beyond — housing, food, medical, therapy, job training and education — without charging for it or taking any government funding. About 30 women at a time are split among six homes, where they learn to care for each other as well as themselves according to 24 spiritual principles inspired by the Benedictine Rule.

The paper labels on the bath and beauty products are made from thistles, which is also handmade by the women, and is symbolic to their lives. Magdalene founder Becca Stevens, an Episcopal priest, told NPR about thistles: “It grows in the places that are abandoned and kind of forgotten, and it also has a history of survival by brutality — but it also has this beautiful deep purple center.”

Magdalene is for women like Penny Hall, a lesbian, who was homeless and would get high to prostitute herself to men for money. She told NPR, “I never thought I’d be at a place making healing oil,” but that Thistle Farms and the Magdalene program have been her saving grace.

Seventy percent of the women who join Magdalene are clean and sober 2 1/2 years after starting the program, and they’re well-equipped to start a new life. The project offers a matched savings program to help prepare for economic independence upon graduation, and women who remain in recovery two years past graduation are eligible for a new home buying program.

Both donations and Thistle Farms profits help fund Magdalene. The project regularly has a waiting list of 80-100 women, which we can all help whittle down by purchasing products or donating.

“Magdalene was founded not only to help a subculture of women, but also to help change the culture itself. We stand in solidarity with women who are recovering from abuse, addiction, and life on the streets, and who have paid dearly for a culture that still buys and sells women.” — thistlefarms.org

“Hair powder for hair on days of unwash” — how sweetly put! For lazy hair days, I’ve been wanting to try Lulu Organics’ hair powder for a while but couldn’t quite justify the price of the full-size package. This travel-size runs $9.50, with free shipping from the brand directly. I bought one but haven’t used it yet — I can’t decide whether to keep it or give it! But honestly… I’ll probably keep it. The Lavender scent smells amazing.

How crazy is it that current FDA laws concerning personal care products haven’t changed since 1938? Apparently cosmetics companies aren’t required to meet any standards or regulations with their products. Crazy.

But there’s good news! Annie Leonard from The Story of Stuff has narrated this excellent video to educate us about what the heck we’re putting on our bodies, and on the very day it was released (July 22), the Safe Cosmetics Act of 2010 was introduced in Congress.

To take action and encourage your representatives to support the act, visit SafeCosmetics.org.

Token quote from the 8-minute video: ”Even babies are being born pre-polluted.” Blarg.

Read more at SafeCosmetics.org, a sponsor of this video, and at GreenBiz.com.

I’ve finally found it: A shampoo and conditioner to be loyal to.

I didn’t used to think much of where my hair products came from (especially if I could buy them where I bought my groceries and they didn’t cost more than a frozen pizza). But then I used a sample of Pureology conditioner that I got from Whole Foods, and honestly, cue hair-commercial-cliches. Silky, soft and shiny, check check check. It just gave my hair a way better texture than usual.

This was when I still lived in Kansas City, so I bought my full-size bottles at Beauty Brands. The price of $27 each for a 10.1-oz. shampoo and 8.5-oz. conditioner (the sizes shown above) was steep, but the sample already had me committed. I’ve since read on the bottle that the shampoo is concentrated, promising 80 shampoos per bottle, so I’ve gotten in the habit of using smaller squirts. And you know how sulfate-free shampoos typically lather less than drugstore shampoos? With a little massaging, this one lathers up really well.

For the price point, I’ve been alternating it with a more affordable brand on days that I don’t need great hair. But the brand is amazing, for its quality of conditioning PLUS its social responsibility. From the Pureology website:

• 25% post consumer recycled content in all shampoo and hair condition bottles, aiming to increase it to 50% in the near future
• Organic botanicals
• 100% vegan
• Salon merchandising units made out of recyclable aluminum and LEED-certified alucobond
• Concentrated formulas (for smaller bottles & lower transportation costs)
• Decreased water, energy use and waste in manufacturing facilities

Pureology is also available in liter sizes and travel sizes, the latter being a great way to try it out for less. They call the product “great colour care,” and I do have moderately colored hair right now, but it’s a great condition regardless. It’s available at salons and other “authorized dealers” that you can find by zip code here.

I was not compensated for this post in any way. I just really like this stuff.

I told you a few weeks ago about my new EcoTools cosmetics bags — and now I get to give away three overnight bags!

To enter, you can leave a comment on this post about why you would like to have one of these bags, and you can tweet a link to this post including the words “recycled-content cosmetics bags by EcoTools & Alicia Silverstone.”

I will pick three winners — one by how much you really need the bag (as conveyed in your comment… that’ll be fun!), one randomly chosen from the comments and one randomly chosen from Twitter. The contest will end Wednesday, Jan. 27 at 3 p.m. CST.

Thanks everyone. Enjoy!

I had such a nice Christmas this year. It was a whirlwind of Midwest roadtripping (to Colorado, then to Oklahoma), but we were fortunate to avoid any snow-sasters, such as is covering Kansas City right now. There’s a foot of snow on the ground, and today’s high is FOUR! And the city can’t handle all the snowplowing, and our car is somewhat buried in our basement garage. Ah, c’est la vie. (And at least I don’t have anywhere to be.)

After not shopping much last year, I made up a very specific Christmas list — and Santa was very generous!

I got those gorgeous vegetable-tanned leather Terra Plana heels (a 21 on the Eco Matrix),

this pleather jacket from a local boutique (because I wanted both heels and a leather jacket, I decided to balance them out by asking for one made of real leather and one that was synthetic; read more about the impacts of leather here),

and some sweet girly things! New perfumes, gold studs, neon orange nail polish and red lipstick, and those two bangle bracelets in the middle are made from fiberglass left over from a prosthetics manufacturing facility in Oklahoma City! I love them. (Thank you Christiane!)

And maybe best of all, Jon and I decided to get each other a digital SLR, which we can thank for making my pictures here slightly better than usual. (But I still need to learn about all the settings! Like, how can I get an indoor picture without flash to not turn out garishly yellow? These are all Photoshopped, and they’re still not right.)

I hope all your Christmas dreams came true, too!

If they existed before now, I guess I didn’t get the memo. A few months ago I was shopping for a new toiletries bag for traveling, so I headed to Target — not thinking I had any better alternatives. Bad graphics, bad shapes, bad materials… none combined design and function well enough to justify a purchase that already lacked any conscientious qualities.

Several weeks later, I got a press release about a new line from EcoTools — makeup and overnight bags made with hemp and recycled materials! I guess good things do come to those who wait. They offered to send me my own for review.

I used several of the bags while traveling over Christmas, and I swear I’m not exaggerating just to make EcoTools happy with me, but they are exactly what I was looking for…

Good color and texture: The outside of the bags is a natural/khaki color with dark green piping. I’ve had light-colored bags before that inevitably got tarnished with every color in my makeup bag… even on the outside. But this color and texture doesn’t show it.

Hemp and recycled content: The outside of the bags are made of 63 percent hemp, a crop that requires no pesticides or herbicides. (The other 37 percent is conventional cotton.) The linings are 51 percent recycled PET (the other 49 percent is polyester). And the graphics are printed with non-toxic inks, and the hangtags are printed on tree-free paper.

Nice design: I like it! In an aisle filled with lots of pinks, this motif is pretty fresh.

Good bag shapes: A lot to choose from, big to small. The bigger bags have smaller compartments inside. Even options for brushes.

Super affordable: $8.99 to $19.99!

Available now at Target and Walgreens. View styles (including inside pics) at EcoTools.

This line was created in collaboration with Alicia Silverstone. (Cher, I heard about Tai… I’m really sorry. *Hug.*)

For easy exfoliating, add SUGAR to your regular facewash once or twice a week. Brilliant! I’ve done it, it’s cheap and simple, and it works.

To give credit where credit is due, this tip came from the show’s makeup artist. (Made it through the egos.)