Founded in 2015 by Melissa Lynn Torre, a chef interested in both nutrition and food sustainability, it wasn't long before Vellum Street soap maker/mayhem slayer Melissa Lynn Torre started paying attention to not only what she put IN her body, but also ON it. After battling an auto-immune disease for decades, and finding no relief via traditional channels, Melissa began to realize so many commercially available soaps & skin care products today are formulated with ingredients you would never eat, so why slather them on your skin, which, like your digestive system, absorbs everything you put on it?!

After a growing interest & extensive research, Melissa discovered a slew of ingredients, many of which were leftover/excess ingredients in her cafe Cookie Confidential's own kitchen, that held numerous benefits for the skin, most notably, tallow. Not long after, Melissa stepped away from the world of pastry and private cheffing, and into the world of upcycled skincare. Creating products that are comprised of nothing that doesn't directly benefit skin health, along with being able to put to good use many food "scraps" that were once headed for the trash bin in many commercial kitchens, led Melissa to an exciting new venture that combined her love of food & creating in the kitchen with her desire to improve nutrition and food sustainability for both her and those around her struggling with similar issues. 

At Vellum Street, they don't believe you should put anything on your skin that you wouldn't put in your mouth. All of their tallow based soaps, balms, lotions, salts, and candles are made from high quality, food grade ingredients, locally & organically sourced, often from the kitchens of local restaurants & farms in the form of upcycled material that would normally be considered waste. Vellum Street has been commercially selling and formulating tallow skincare since 2015. They work with a handful of small farms in the Philadelphia/Bucks/Chester/Lancaster County areas, but mainly Tussock Sedge and Wyebrook.