Beauty of Joseon

Beauty of Joseon is a South Korean skincare brand based in the Gangnam district of Seoul. It builds its range around Hanbang — traditional Korean herbal medicine — reworked into modern, fragrance-free formulas aimed at sensitive skin. The brand is owned by Goodai Global Inc., the Seoul company that acquired and relaunched it in 2019 [6]. While the corporate ownership places it in the "acquired" category, the brand itself remains highly active, with new product lines and editorial output through 2026 [5].

Much of its international visibility comes from a single product, the Relief Sun sunscreen, which became widely circulated on TikTok and helped make the United States the brand's largest market.

The name refers to the Joseon dynasty and the era's beauty traditions, rather than to a founding date. According to the company, the range draws on the Gyuhap Chongseo, a Joseon-era household encyclopedia written by the female scholar Yi Bingheogak; some third-party sources instead trace the brand's inspiration to the Donguibogam, a historic Korean medical text [8][9].

The brand's early history is recorded inconsistently across sources. The trade directory TheIndustry.beauty gives a founding year of 2016 and lists Hyemin Park among the original founders [7]. Editorial coverage instead centres on a 2019 relaunch, when a team acquired the brand and, in Glossy's account, "totally reinvented it, introducing the version today's U.S. consumers know" [6]; Cult Beauty and Glossy credit Sumin Lee as the figure who created and relaunched that modern incarnation. The brand's own about-page names no founder and states no founding year.

Beauty of Joseon is owned and distributed by Goodai Global Inc., a company registered in Seoul that describes itself as a "brand owner and global distributor" [4]. Goodai Global acquired and relaunched the brand in 2019, the move most editorial accounts treat as the start of its current incarnation [6]. The company operates the brand as a standalone label and, per its corporate statement, works through contract manufacturers, packaging and raw-material suppliers, and logistics partners; specific manufacturing countries are not disclosed.

The brand's stated aim is to turn the history of Hanbang into everyday skincare. Its about-page frames this through a guiding question — "What if we took the history of Hanbang and transformed it into skincare you'd want to carry everywhere and show all your beauty-obsessed friends?" — and describes its formulas as gentle, effective, and rooted in traditional self-care rituals. Its tagline, "Inspired By Hanbang. Connected by Community.", pairs that heritage framing with an emphasis on its customer community.

Editorial coverage places the brand in the "affordable luxury" segment, appealing to shoppers focused on the glass-skin and glow aesthetics associated with K-beauty [8]. Products are described as fragrance-free and suitable for sensitive skin, and the company says all of them are developed without animal testing.

The range centres on Hanbang ingredients — ginseng, rice, propolis, green plum, green tea, centella asiatica, red bean, and mugwort — which the brand pairs with modern actives such as niacinamide and retinal. The company frames this as combining time-honoured herbs with lab-backed, clinically effective ingredients.

Its best-known product is the Relief Sun sunscreen (Rice + Probiotics, SPF50+), which the brand credits with shifting how its customers view sunscreen. A later signature version, Relief Sun Aqua-Fresh: Rice + B5, carries advanced SPF filters that, according to Sumin Lee, were previously unavailable in the United States [6]. Other recurring products include the Glow Replenishing Rice Milk Toner, built around a dual-layer formula, and the Glow Serum (Propolis + Niacinamide). Through 2026 the brand extended into body sunscreens, the focus of its most recent product announcements [5].

Beauty of Joseon's profile is closely tied to social media. Glossy described the Relief Sun sunscreen as "somewhat ubiquitous" on TikTok, and Cult Beauty called it "a TikTok sensation" [6][8]. Lee has attributed the brand's rise in the United States to the product's lightweight texture and to TikTok itself, noting that much of its TikTok Shop volume comes from resellers; the brand has also gained traction on Amazon.

Beauty of Joseon is active. It operates as a standalone brand under Goodai Global Inc., which acquired and relaunched it in 2019; the "acquired" status reflects that ownership rather than any pause in operations. The brand continued launching products and publishing editorial content into mid-2026, with its newest visible activity dated June 2026 [5]. Its stated largest market is the United States, though it ships across Europe and North America and is stocked by retailers including Boots and Sephora [7].