UNDER THE DRYER

You Asked - We Delivered. Learn All About YOUR Perfect Hair Mask From The Chemist Who Created It

Our #1 customer request? A deeply hydrating, lusciously nourishing hair mask that works for their hair type. Hana Sheik, our Senior Manager of Product Development’s answer? JVN’s New Nurture Intense Hydration Mask.

Written By: JVN Team

July 24, 2023

6 Min Read

You said it loud and clear. You wanted a moisturizing hair mask with a cutting edge formula that leaves your strands feeling soft, smooth and hydrated without building up or weighing hair down. Ask and you shall receive! JVN’s New Nurture Intense Hydration Mask is high performance product innovation at its finest, providing up to 72 hours of hydration in just 3 minutes thanks to an impressive lineup of ingredients that set it apart from the pack.

When a new product is this impressive, we need all the tea on what it takes to get it from a juicy idea all the way to a luscious hair mask. We checked in with Hana Sheikh, JVN’s super creative formulation chemist and Senior Manager of Product Development to get the backstory on developing this hair hydrating game changer.

1. Hi Hana! Can you tell us a little bit about yourself and what a product developer does?

Hi! I have a product formulator background, which has allowed me to develop over 100 products throughout my career. Now, as the Senior Manager of Product Development, I help bring new products to life through every step of the process. I listen to customer feedback and closely watch trends across the haircare landscape, all while searching for innovative ingredients and working with our Amyris labs to influence the ingredients we develop in house. I take the product from the idea stages all the way through the packaging phases, testing and re-testing to ensure the product performs perfectly with every use.

2. From a scientific point of view, can you tell us the difference between a hair mask and a hair conditioner?

A hair mask is intended to deliver long term hair benefits while a conditioner is designed to maintain hair health from day to day. Hair conditioners need to be lightweight enough to layer other styling products on top of when out of the shower and are mostly intended to smooth hair cuticles, which are found on the outermost layer of your hair. Masks contain additional benefits, with the aim to penetrate more deeply past that outer layer and into the cortex where they can provide hydrating or repairing benefits, depending on the mask formula you choose.

3. Many hair masks are designed for specific hair types. How did we ensure this one would work for all of them? We

The honest answer is round after round of testing on all hair types from 1a to 4c and all textures from fine to coarse. We made tweaks based on each round of feedback until we had a product that provided the target benefits for everyone.

One of the key players in the universality of the formulation is our patented Hemisqualane, which is lightweight enough for the finest hair, but moisturizing enough for even the most coarse hair textures. As a sustainable sugarcane-derived silicone alternative, it adds to the shine, softness and bounce you get from using the mask, but won’t build up and create the heavy, greasy feel that some silicones are known to. This is a huge point of difference between this mask and others.

4. How many rounds did it take to perfect the Nurture Intense Hydration Mask formula and what was the most challenging part about getting this mask just right?

This mask had more than 20 rounds of formula tweaks over the course of 9 months, which for a hair mask is on the high side. We were definitely aiming for perfection here.

The mask market is so inundated already, we knew we had to source the most innovative ingredients that would both hydrate the hair, but not weigh it down while still being sustainable and highly effective for all hair types. We didn’t want to put a mask out that mimicked all of the other products and ingredients already lining the shelves. We wanted to offer something new and fresh.

5. What is a Triple Hydration System?

This uniquely innovative system is able to provide deep hydration because of three key ingredients that work together to not only reach the inner layers of your hair, but to also smooth the outer layer to lock everything in.

Keratris is our vegan keratin alternative, which fortifies the outer layer of your hair to keep nutrients and hydration locked in place for longer.

Next are Amino Acids, which function as protein building blocks. The complex we use is already naturally found in your hair, which makes it easy for your hair to recognize.

Then we have Hemisqualane. It’s a tiny molecule, so it acts as a delivery system to get our amino acid complex deep into the strand.

6. Can you dive deeper into what Keratris is?

Keratris is a clean, vegan keratin alternative which is lab-derived from upcycled oranges after their juice has been extracted. Its purpose is to act as similarly to animal-derived keratin as possible in order to leave your hair looking and feeling strong and shiny. There are vegan protein alternatives out there, but this one’s similarity to Keratin really helps it perform optimally at repairing and fortifying the cuticle.

7. What did it take to get the right scent?

It was wild trying to get the perfect scent nailed down. This process was very meticulous, we started with intensive research on the most appealing scent notes (citrus and vanilla), but it was important to us that we have a fresh, non-gendered take that was very us. Scent after scent was tested on huge groups of people, including our internal JVN team, with each new round incorporating all of the feedback. We must have gone 50+ rounds, taking notes from versions that people liked and dialing them up or down in different combinations until we perfected it. I have boxes and boxes of rejected scents from this one. It was worth it though, the final scent is incredible.

8. What was your favorite part of coming up with this mask and what is it like to work with JVN founder, Jonathan Van Ness?

This product really allowed me to showcase my expertise and creativity, so it was very fun to watch it come to life. Working with Jonathan is phenomenal. They’re super involved from the very start, coming up with ideas for the products, testing them and giving incredibly helpful, insightful, expert feedback. They’re very specific and detail oriented. It can be difficult when a founder without a hair background provides feedback about what they would like to tweak, that feedback tends to be more general, but Jonathan can provide pinpoint recommendations for exactly what the product needs because of their lengthy time in the hair industry. Their level of involvement in the formulation process really helps make these products so high performance.

Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us, Hana! We love the 72 hours of hydration this mask instantly gives our hair. We can’t wait to see what you’ll dream up next!