Sandstone Scandinavia

Sandstone Scandinavia is a Danish makeup company based in Odense, founded in 2015 by Jesper K. Hansen [2]. It develops colour cosmetics aimed at people with sensitive skin and allergies, built around a fragrance-free, vegan, and allergy-tested approach. The company remains active and family-run, with two of the founder's daughters involved in its direction.

The brand grew out of a personal experience. After developing a perfume allergy himself, Hansen — a father of three girls — set out to make makeup his daughters could use without irritation. He describes the origin as "a desire ... to develop skin-friendly makeup for my daughters," adding that his own allergy made clear "how important clean ingredients, honesty, and thoughtfulness are" [2].

Hansen founded Sandstone Scandinavia in Odense in 2015 [2]. The company frames its starting point as the skin rather than a particular ingredient category, summarising its position as "everything ... starts with the skin." Two of Hansen's daughters, Caroline and Sofie, are described as actively shaping the brand today.

Sandstone positions itself around three stated pillars — nature, skin-friendliness, and purity — but its central argument is that "natural" is not a reliable guide to safety. The company says it "quickly learned that natural doesn't always mean gentle, and synthetic doesn't always mean harmful," and that what matters is whether ingredients are "carefully selected, effective, and safe" [2]. In practice this means combining plant-based and synthetic ingredients chosen for compatibility with sensitive and allergy-prone skin, rather than marketing formulas as purely natural.

The brand's tagline describes it as "Danish and allergy-friendly makeup without fragrance." According to the company, its products contain no perfume, essential oils, or natural fragrances, and are formulated to avoid known allergens.

Sandstone makes a broad range of colour cosmetics spanning face, cheeks, eyes, and lips, alongside brushes and gift sets. Its stated best-seller is the Grand Danois Mascara, which the company says was developed with close attention to ingredient selection [2]. Other products include the Hydrate + Protect Face Primer, a Skincare Foundation, the Hide & Blend Concealer, and the Big Crush Blush.

The company reports that its mascaras contain less than one part per million of nickel, a threshold it considers safe for people with nickel allergies, and that its products are free of PFAS, a group of persistent synthetic chemicals. It also states that its formulas are paraben-free — using phenoxyethanol as a preservative — and gluten-free, and are manufactured within the EU.

Sandstone's products carry Allergy Certified, an independent certification created in Denmark. The company describes the scheme as requiring toxicologists and pharmacists to risk-assess every raw material, with independent laboratory testing for nickel and cobalt; products qualify only when both are measured below one part per million and no known allergens, hormone-disrupting, or carcinogenic substances are present [3]. The homepage states that 95% of the range is Allergy Certified.

The company says all its products are 100% vegan, avoiding animal-derived materials such as beeswax, lanolin, and carmine, and using "carefully selected plant-based and synthetic ingredients" in their place [3]. It maintains a no-animal-testing policy and says it supports ANIMA, a Danish organisation opposed to animal testing. On sourcing, Sandstone states that the mica used in its products is obtained without child labour, backed by supplier guarantees. Zeroallergy, an allergy-products retailer that stocks the brand, has described Sandstone as "the only independent Allergy Certified makeup brand" for people with sensitive skin or skin allergies [8].

Coverage of Sandstone has been concentrated in Nordic industry and regional media. In December 2022, founder Jesper K. Hansen was interviewed by the Nordic industry publication Scandinavian MIND for an outlook piece on the beauty sector, where he pointed to growing consumer focus on clean beauty and the value of "independent and science-based certifications" [6]. In the same interview he described 2022 as a recovery year after the Covid lockdown — noting new partnerships and product development — while flagging supply-chain pressure on raw materials that had delayed some launches [6]. The brand has also been featured by the Danish allergy-products retailer Zeroallergy.

Sandstone Scandinavia is a family-owned business. In March 2026, the Danish investor Jesper Buch — a co-founder of Just Eat and a judge on the television programme Løvens Hule, the Danish edition of Shark Tank — acquired a 10% stake during an appearance on the show [7]. According to the regional newspaper Fyens Stiftstidende, which reported the investment, the company remained family-owned after the deal [7].

The brand is active. It operates a direct online store shipping to more than two dozen European countries and maintains a social-media presence, and its most recent notable coverage was the March 2026 report of the Løvens Hule investment [7].