[BenM]

I’m not a fan of lush but ultimately customers love them and they have store fronts and online retail that most would only dream of.

lemon slices? Would I do it? No but lemon slices will hopefully introduce less potential food then any other “natural lemon” I’d personally use essential oil. But not everyone wants that. No I don’t have a lab to do a clinical analysis to back up my claim but I’m not calling it a clinical claim merely suggesting a path to explore

at the end of the day most people formulating for themselves are probably going to try things most cosmetic chemists would frown upon, I certainly have and continue to do so. 

As as to the ewax, well I’ve only used about a dozen on the market so can not comment on every single one of them. I suggest polawax, deviate to some other ewax and I would hope they are smart enough to find out what changes to make or come back and ask. I recommend polawax because it’s been the most straight forward and the most forgiving in my experience

if we are forcing learning how to create an emulsification system before making anything I think you’ll find many won’t bother learning with such a high barrier of entry and high failure rate but with interest and success people might be interested in learning the different ways of calculating emulsifiers over time as they become comfortable and want to find better ways to meet their new and growing demand.

i personally started with ewax as a curiosity, now I have multiple systems I love and have branched out to other polymer emulsifiers to create a multitude of things. 

While I do understand why cosmetic chemists will push for education, for following simplicity, for following tried and true paths and want to guide them to the more complicated systems because yes the emulsifiers I have make some amazing luxurious and wonderful products they also aren’t all that easy to work with and have limitations on other ingredients, can spontaneously become unstable and are or cant be somewhat delicate especially when sitting at the maximum of what they can handle and a slight slip of the hand will mean the difference between stable and breakdown.

All I’d like to see is the barrier of entry set for everyone who comes to learn at a level they can learn from and at a pace and depth they want to learn because you can’t force a donkey to read but you can guide a curious person to more when they are ready

[BenM]

There are of course a multitude of other emulsifiers available and many commercial products rely upon emulsifying waxes. 

I could have written a long winded reply about using a specific emulsyfing system that would require some testing and experimentation but I’ve taken the view that the poster was looking for a solution that would be within the scope of being accomplished by someone who might not have the techniqual skill set required to formulate an advanced formulation and wanted something that would be stable with a high level of potential success. 

[BenM]

Hey, hope you don’t mind me chiming in. 

Personally I would attempt to get a cream at the thickness you want rather then copy something from lush. Really their products aren’t “great” but they have fantastic marketing, story and visual appeal something most brands are desperate for but lack.

But to your formula  

They use a lot of basic things but I think your quantities on your bees wax and lanolin are a little high even though based on the list of ingredients it would trick you into believing there is more wax then they really add. I think there is A LOT more shea butter being added. 

So my take based on your ingredients 

heated water phase
water (lemon slices added during heating) too 100%

Heated oil phase
15% Shea butter
1% beeswax
1% lanolin
4% mango butter
2% coconut oil
2% sunflower oul
4% apricot kernel oil 
.5% Vitamin E oil
2% Stearic acid
1% cetyl alcohol

7% Emulsifying wax (Croda Polawax or other self emulsifying wax) it might be higher or lower depending on your wax 

cool down phase
1% dimethicone
1 % fragrance 
*% Preservative
.5% xanthen gum (create slurry in glycerine) 
2% glycerine 

Adding water soluable things that can handle the heating phase like hydrolysed proteins and adding other things after making a slurry with glycerine

If you want to be super tricky sepimax zen is an ingredients to look at that will stabilise, improve sensory on application, thicken and is super easy to use and compatible with emulsifying wax

what I’ve gone too is not something that you’d buy at lush but I think it will improve the thickness and drag