Octo, the skin care brand cofounded by alpine ski racer Lucas Pinheiro Braathen, is launching its second product — an SPF that he tested in myriad climates as he trains and competes around the world, most recently winning gold for Brazil in the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan and Cortina, Italy.
Powered by zinc oxide, Octo’s Broad Spectrum SPF 40 Mineral Facial Sunscreen delivers UVA and UVB protection alongside ceramides and phytosphingosine to mirror the skin’s natural lipid architecture and reduce transepidermal water loss, while sandalwood offers soothing and antimicrobial properties and licorice root and turmeric work as antioxidants. It will be available at octoskincare.com on June 22, priced at $50.
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With his hectic schedule taking him to myriad climates, Pinheiro Braathen proved to be the ideal guinea pig when testing different formulas of the SPF.
“I’ve been trying these samples as I do with all our products through all the different climates that my journey takes me on, whether that is above 3,000 meters altitude skiing in December in Colorado, or if it’s here in Ipanema Beach, in the most humid environment on earth, by the ocean, and everything in between, with a bunch of traveling on planes,” Pinheiro Braathen said over Zoom from Rio de Janeiro. “This is the last formulation that we got to, where it suits for training, sweating in warm water, humidity, all the way to high altitude. And being something that feels natural and clean on the skin and that doesn’t dry it out.”
Octo’s first product, Restorative Moisturizer, $180, was launched at the end of 2025 and is stocked at Printemps.
There will be a third skin care launch, before Octo expands into other categories, according to Pinheiro Braathen. “Octo’s journey had its entrance into this industry through skin care, but its intentions from day one is that it is a health brand.”
Pinheiro Braathen said he was approached about cofounding a number of brands, but while skin care wasn’t top of mind, this brand stood out to him in part due to its ingredients, which are sustainably sourced from Brazil through a fair-trade agreement. The product is then formulated in California, while the packaging is designed in Milan. His cofounder is automotive tastemaker Ted Gushue.
“I feel like the purpose of me being in Octo is because of how I can live Octo,” Pinheiro Braathen said. “All of our products are a product of my lived and felt experience with all of the products that I R&D together with my crew living the life that I do and putting them all to test and all of the feedback and moderations that we do with each formulation comes from experiences from all the things that I go through and because I travel at such frequency through such a wide range of climates.
“I never wanted to create a brand with my name on it, because I wanted something that does not depend on me, because it’s not about me, it’s so much bigger than me, and I think that’s what Octo is about,” he continued. “It’s like, ‘Hey, I’m not what this brand is.’ Nature is. I am simply something that embodies it and can voice it and can be a face of it, because I live it and I believe in it.”