What is Kawakawa?

What is Kawakawa? 🌿

Nature’s Little Healing Hero from Aotearoa

If you’ve ever walked a bush track in Aotearoa, chances are you’ve brushed past a Kawakawa plant without even realising it. With its heart-shaped, holey leaves and spicy scent, Kawakawa (Macropiper excelsum) is one of our most treasured native healing herbs and it’s the star ingredient in nearly everything we make at Tiny Leaf.

Used in rongoā Māori (traditional Māori medicine) for generations, Kawakawa has amazing benefits for skin. It’s known for its natural anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, and antifungal properties making it perfect for soothing eczema, nappy rash, dry skin, cuts, bites, and pretty much anything grumpy and irritated.

At Tiny Leaf, we hand-pick our leaves from wild-growing, spray-free Kawakawa in the Wellington and Wairarapa regions. We gently infuse them into natural oils to create our Kawakawa infused oil, which becomes the healing base of our balms, sugar scrubs, and face masks.

Why we love Kawakawa in skincare:

• 🌿 Soothes dry, itchy, and irritated skin
• 🧴 Gentle enough for baby skincare
• 🌏 All-natural and NZ made
• 💚 Packed with healing properties

We keep our ingredients simple and our process slow—because nature knows best. Whether you’re using our Kawakawa balm, repair stick, or Kawakawa sugar scrub, you’re treating your skin to a little bit of New Zealand’s natural skincare magic.

Curious to try it?

Check out our full range of handmade Kawakawa skincare here