Anhydrous colour cosmetics
the pH studio is a Toronto-based makeup R&D consultancy, partnering with beauty brands and founders from formulation through commercialization.
Whether you are a founder launching your first product, a growing brand extending your product range, or an established beauty brand that needs senior R&D, bring your product vision, and I’ll bring the chemistry to make it work.
“We have a concept and need someone to formulate it.”
Formulation development →“Lab batches worked perfectly, but it’s failing scale-up.”
Scale-up and troubleshooting →“We need senior R&D leadership, but not a full-time hire.”
Fractional R&D leadership →Services
I work in an advisory capacity. Bench work runs through your lab or the manufacturer you already use, and I set and steer the technical direction, on site with your team when that is what the problem needs.
01
From a concept, a texture reference, or a sketch on a napkin, to a stable anhydrous formula ready for production. I write the technical brief and direct the bench work through your lab or manufacturer.
02
For formulas that behave in the lab and fail everywhere else. Texture drift, bleed, sweating, breakage, fill and batch-to-batch variation.
03
Ongoing senior leadership for brands that need an experienced R&D partner without a full-time hire.
A fixed-scope look at a formula that is not behaving, or a brief before it is locked. One to two weeks, a flat fee, and a written set of findings with a recommended path. Often the first step before committing to a project.
How engagements work
A call to understand the project, the constraints and the deadline, followed by a written technical brief that sets the target texture, performance and process.
Iteration directed through your lab or manufacturer, with sample review and on-site sessions, when needed.
Stability, compatibility and scale-up readiness, then support through pilot and first production runs.
The specialty
Anhydrous (aka waterless) systems have real advantages. A high payload of pigment and actives, no preservative system to defend, and textures with a richness that is difficult to build any other way.
They are also unforgiving. Wax crystallises on its own schedule, pigment can bleed if not dispersed properly, and the margin between a texture that glides and one that drags is narrow. Small changes in formula and process move all of it.
Most of makeup is anhydrous. Getting it right is what I’ve built a career on.
The work
Formulas I developed hands-on at the bench, from first trial to launch.
Launches delivered by teams I led at MAC Cosmetics and Estée Lauder.
Garnier BB Cream and Maybelline Color Show Nails, localized for the Indian market. White-space analysis and competitive benchmarking shaping the Consumer Products Division innovation roadmap.
2021 CEW Beauty Award winner, Lip Treatment category. R&D spokesperson on social media, featuring and promoting launches alongside beauty influencers. Collaborations with celebrity makeup artists. Featured expert, Smithsonian Channel documentary on natural cosmetics.
Excerpted from recommendations on LinkedIn.
“Preeti combined scientific expertise and strategic thinking with a strong commercial mindset to elevate the MAC Brand. … Preeti often went above and beyond, guiding branded innovation projects from bench through commercialization, invigorating the MAC Cosmetics' global lip portfolio. She partnered seamlessly across Product Development, Marketing, Packaging, Quality and Manufacturing to deliver complex, high impact launches. … Any organization would be lucky to have her as an R&D partner.”
“Bringing Preeti onto our in-house R&D team was one of the best decisions we made. … She invented and commercialized some of Bite's most iconic products, including Matte Crème Lip Crayon, Agave Lip Mask, and BB for Lips with SPF, while also helping develop our innovative Lip Lab concept that created a unique consumer experience for the brand. Her contributions helped establish Bite Beauty as Sephora's fastest-growing (by percentage sales growth) color cosmetics brand during that period. … I would recommend her without hesitation.”
“Preeti combines deep scientific knowledge with strong business acumen, translating complex challenges into practical solutions while driving meaningful results. A strategic thinker and trusted collaborator, Preeti has a unique ability to align teams, navigate ambiguity, and deliver with excellence. … I highly recommend her as an outstanding R&D professional and an asset to any organization.”
Read the full recommendations on LinkedIn.
The founder
Most people never wonder why a balm melts at exactly the right moment, or how a lip gloss can feel like nothing at all and still stay put for hours. I've thought about little else for fifteen years. It's that curiosity that moved me from India to New Jersey for a Master's in Cosmetic Science, and followed me through labs in three countries before I landed in Toronto, which I've called home ever since.
My specialty is anhydrous chemistry, aka waterless systems, which, once you notice it, is most of makeup: sticks, balms, crayons, glosses, oils, cream compacts, waterless colour of every kind.
I built that expertise in three places, and each one taught me something the next one needed. L'Oréal is where I learned the basics; fine tuning and testing formulas with hundreds of real consumers, until I understood that a formula isn't finished until it works on real skin, on a real day. Bite Beauty is where I proved it. Making makeup out of things you could eat, and still making it genuinely good. And Estée Lauder is where I did it at scale, leading R&D for MAC Cosmetics, and the job meant two things at once: guiding the science behind some of the brand's most iconic launches, and growing the scientists who made them.
Somewhere along the way, the interesting questions stopped being only about the ingredients. Which idea deserves the investment? Will a formula that behaves beautifully in the lab survive a production line? Where is the white space, and what should fill it? What can realistically reach shelf in nine months, and what can't?
That's most of what I do now, and more or less why I started the pH studio. Nothing excites me more than the moment a vision becomes something you can hold, whether that's a formula built from a blank page, one that keeps failing at scale, or a team that needs an R&D voice in the room.
The pH Studio is based here in Toronto, proudly Canadian, and happy to work with brands anywhere.
Connect on LinkedInFrequently asked questions
Anything from a single formula to a multi-product roadmap. If it is anhydrous, it is in scope.
It depends on the complexity of the brief, how many rounds of iteration a texture needs, and your lab's capacity. I will give you a realistic timeline once I understand what we are making.
Earlier than most people expect. The cheapest problems to solve are the ones caught before a formula is locked. That said, I also join mid-development, at scale-up, or after launch when something is not behaving.
Always, nothing you share goes anywhere.
Yes, and usually that is how the work runs. I direct development through your existing lab or manufacturer, or help you find and vet one that suits the format.
I advise rather than lead here. I will help you shape a testing strategy, pressure-test what a formula can credibly claim, and give an initial review of regulatory restrictions and ingredient labels. The testing itself, and formal regulatory sign-off, sits with your lab and regulatory specialist.
Yes. Ongoing R&D leadership on a part-time basis is one of the three ways I work. The right cadence depends on what your roadmap demands, so we scope the commitment together at the outset and revisit it as the work evolves.
Toronto, Canada. Projects run remotely with brands anywhere, and I visit your lab or manufacturer on site when the work calls for it.
Enquiries
Now accepting new projects
Prefer to talk first? Email me and I’ll send a few times that work: preeti@thephstudio.com