Have you ever wondered if you could repurpose those wilting old bouquet roses before they pass on to the next life? Or perhaps you have a prolific rose bush that blooms more than you can find uses for the buds? Today I’m going to show you how to make rose water using dried roses at home!

After this tutorial you will actually have two different types – distilled rose water (a hydrosol that is shelf-stable) and steeped rose water (a concentrated brew that is not shelf-stable but can be frozen for later use.) Both are incredible in their own way!

Why Rose Water?

Rose water is well known as a skin care product. Unfortunately, if you turn around the bottles of most store-bought ones to read the ingredient lists, you will find that there is a lot more than just rose and water in them, and some might not even have real rose in the product! Crazy, right?

The REAL stuff is what you want. It can be used for so many purposes – facial toner, face mask ingredient, hair treatment, makeup remover, pillow spray, fragrance, flavor – truly, the sky is the limit! (Elle.)

I use my distilled rose water every morning and evening before I use my homemade moisturizing oil (simply olive oil + tea tree oil for anyone wondering.) I also like to save and use my steeped rose water to hydrate clay face masks when I use them.

How To Make It

I’m using home grown roses from my garden, but any fresh or dried rose petals without pesticide-treatment will work!

1. Add the petals to a pot and then set a small, empty dish in the center to collect the rosewater. (I elevated my glass dish on a mason jar lid ring to avoid excess heat that could lead to cracking.)
2. Fill the pot with filtered water, leaving a few inches below the rim of the collection container.
3. Invert a pot lid over the top of the pot. (Yes, upside down. It should create a seal over the pot – keeping the steam trapped inside.)
4. Fill a plastic bag with ice cubes and set it on top of the pot lid.
5. Bring the heat up to a rapid simmer/gentle boil and replace the melted ice as needed.
6. Be sure to watch it so that your water does not boil over into the collection container OR run out and burn the pot/rose petals.
7. It is finished when the color is extracted from the petals.
8. You now have two types: 1) Clear, distilled rosewater; 2) Colored, steeped rosewater

The distilled one is a hydrosol – I use it as a facial toner but there are many other uses for it. It is shelf-stable.

The steeped one is not shelf stable – I freeze it in small amounts and use it to wet out clay facial masks.

Will you try to make your own?

Find my other DIY tutorials here! You can watch a video of how I made my rose water here on my Instagram page.

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