Helan

Helan is an Italian natural-cosmetics company founded in 1976 in Genoa and based today in Casella, in the green hills behind the city [1]. It makes skincare, body care, haircare, fragrance, sun care and a long-running baby line, formulating and packaging its products entirely in Italy. The company is still owned and run by the founding family, now in its second generation, and remains active: it published magazine posts into January 2026 and received a CONAI Ecodesign award in December 2025.

Founded as a small natural-cosmetics laboratory before "green" beauty had a market, Helan built its identity around plant-derived ingredients, a refusal of animal testing that predates European law, and a Made-in-Italy supply chain. It distributes mainly through Italian pharmacies and herbalist shops, with more than 3,000 points of sale across the country, alongside its own e-commerce and Amazon.

Helan was started in 1976 by Elisa Bottini Massa, who left a post as a professor of cosmetology at the University of Genoa to move from academic research into private enterprise [2]. She founded the company with her husband, a lawyer; Italian editorial coverage records his name as Enzo Moncalvo [7], while the brand's own English company page renders it "Enzo Moncalwo" — a spelling best read as a transcription artifact, with the editorial form preferred.

The first products were made in a rented former cinema, the ex cinema Elios, in Genoa's Albaro district, and sold through pharmacies and herbalist shops. The company frames this as a deliberate counter-trend choice, describing a moment when the "Green Wave" was, in its words, "totally unknown to the cosmetic market" [2]. From the start the range included face care, hair care, sun care and a children's line, Linea Bimbi.

Activism around animal welfare came early. In 1979 the company supported an anti-animal-testing petition organised by the Italian group Le.A.L., decades before the European Union's ban on animal testing for cosmetics [2]. A makeup line, "I Colori di Helan," followed in 1984.

As the business grew it outgrew its premises, relocating to a site on Via Adamoli in 1998 and then, in 2015, to its current facility of more than 7,500 square metres in Casella, in the countryside behind Genoa [2]. In 2006 Helan obtained ICEA certification for organic and natural cosmetics. In 2020 it planted a rose garden using the "Rosa Antica della Valle Scrivia," an old local rose, as a source for some of its fragrances.

More recent activity includes a 2024 licensing partnership with the football club Genoa CFC for a co-branded cosmetics line covering the 2024/2025 season, which the company described as joining "two Genoese excellences" around shared values. In December 2025 it received the CONAI Ecodesign 2025 award for sustainable packaging.

The company remains a family enterprise, now run by the second generation, with the founders' sons involved in the business [7]. No parent company or acquisition is documented; Helan operates as an independent firm under the legal name Helan Cosmesi di Laboratorio S.r.l.

Helan presents itself as a laboratory-based natural-cosmetics maker whose formulas are "conceived and realized in harmony with the skin's physiology and nature as well as the environment and animal world." Its positioning rests on what it does not use as much as what it does: editorial coverage summarises the company's "no list" as excluding petroleum derivatives such as paraffin and petrolatum, silicones, parabens, GMOs and the surfactants SLS and SLES [8].

The company says it has been cruelty-free since 1976 and reports long-standing ties to Italian animal-rights organisations, maintaining a stance against animal testing that it describes as exceeding European legal requirements [8]. Products carry transparency details on the label, including the percentage of natural ingredients and a period-after-opening indicator. The audience is largely Italian shoppers in pharmacies and herbalist shops looking for certified-natural, Made-in-Italy cosmetics.

The Helan range is broad, spanning face and body care, haircare, makeup, sun care, home products and fragrance, with more than 500 products across over 40 lines according to the company [2]. Recurring ingredients include Monoï de Tahiti, honey and beehive extracts, wildflower oil and rose extracts from the brand's own garden. The baby line, Linea Bimbi, is built around plant-derived surfactants and is described as tested for tolerability from the first days of life.

Fragrance is a visible part of the catalogue, with eaux de parfum and eaux de toilette such as Rosso d'Ambra, M-Oud and a Monoï de Tahiti scent. Rather than rely solely on outside certifications, Helan developed an internal standard it calls the COSM-ETICO protocol, which editorial coverage describes as emphasising certified organic agriculture, local and fair-trade suppliers, reduced recyclable packaging and sustainable logistics [8]. The company holds ICEA certification, obtained in 2006, and says it prefers Mediterranean-sourced raw materials to limit transport emissions. Most of the range is described as vegan-friendly, apart from items containing honey or propolis.

In 2025 Helan received the CONAI Ecodesign award, an Italian industry recognition tied to sustainable packaging. The company has also been the subject of Italian editorial profiles, including a 2025 feature in the Genoese magazine Mentelocale on its family history and sustainability work, and coverage of its natural-ingredient philosophy in a pharmacy magazine.

Helan is active. The company was still publishing magazine content as of January 2026, when it announced renewed participation in the Comune di Genova's Baby Kit 2026 project, and it continues to enter partnerships and receive industry awards. Its reach is primarily Italian, anchored by more than 3,000 domestic points of sale, with selective export into other European markets. The company is approaching its fiftieth year, having been founded in 1976.