Cold-Pressed Rosehip Seed Oil: What the Process Preserves
The extraction method for carrier oils affects the final product as much as the source material. Here is why cold pressing matters for rosehip.
Rosehip seed oil can be extracted by cold pressing, solvent extraction, or supercritical CO2 extraction. The method used significantly affects the final product, particularly the fatty acid composition and the presence of heat-sensitive compounds like trans-retinoic acid.
Cold pressing
Cold pressing uses mechanical pressure to extract oil from the seed, without the application of heat. The process generates some heat through friction, but temperatures are kept below approximately 49 degrees Celsius to preserve heat-sensitive compounds. Cold-pressed rosehip seed oil retains its characteristic golden-orange colour, which comes from carotenoids including beta-carotene and lycopene.
What heat destroys
Trans-retinoic acid, the natural vitamin A compound in rosehip seed oil, is heat-sensitive. Hot-pressed or solvent-extracted rosehip oil will have significantly lower trans-retinoic acid content than cold-pressed oil. The carotenoids that give the oil its colour are also partially degraded by heat, which is why refined rosehip oil is pale yellow rather than golden-orange.
Solvent extraction
Solvent extraction uses hexane or other solvents to extract oil from the seed material. It produces a higher yield than cold pressing but requires a subsequent refining step to remove solvent residues. The resulting oil is typically lighter in colour and lower in heat-sensitive compounds than cold-pressed oil.
Our rosehip seed oil
Our Rosehip Seed Oil is cold-pressed from Rosa canina seeds sourced from Chile, where the climate produces high-quality rosehip with consistent fatty acid profiles. The oil retains its natural golden-orange colour and is packaged in amber glass to protect the polyunsaturated fatty acids from oxidation.