Market Hauls and Local Noms

This Easter weekend, I went to the Battersea Power Station to check out their first-ever Chocolate Market. During my visit, I got to meet Lettica Phillips, the lovely founder and creator of Skiniri, an award-winning Black-owned, West London-based business offering sustainable, all-natural skincare.

Lettica’s wellness journey started in 2015, when she decided to go all-natural after realizing how many harmful chemicals and toxins were in her skin and haircare products. This shift included cutting off her hair, eliminating heat and relaxers (chemicals used to straighten Black hair), and actively thinking about the ingredients she was absorbing through her body. 

Drawing on her “if I can do it myself, I will” mindset and inspiration from YouTube videos, Lettica started making her own skincare. Upon noticing significant improvement in her skin, she signed up for a course in Natural Skincare, initially only formulating for herself. Eventually, she began sharing her formulations with friends and family, who encouraged her to release her products. 

Lettica launched Skiniri in 2021 with a handcrafted, vegan, and vitamin-rich product line that included a shea and cocoa-butter based body butter, a restoring face and body oil, and an exfoliating scrub. Since then, she explained, “I’ve slowly been expanding to different products. I’m just taking customer feedback and growing.”

Lettica’s attention to customer service is not at all surprising, given her experience working in professional services and doing client feedback for law and accountancy firms. “But I’ve always been very hands on and creative, so it was almost bringing me back to a space that I kind of started off in [when I was] much younger. And it did get me back into that creative building space.”

When I asked Lettica about her goals and dreams for Skiniri, she shared, “I would love to have a full wellness brand, so not just skincare, but moving into haircare, home fragrance, maybe even some home furnishings. I do feel like the space around you goes beyond skincare; it’s about what you surround yourself with [and] making your own natural ecosystem that serves you as much as possible.”

Though I’m excited to see how Lettica’s wellness expertise will translate beyond skincare, I should also emphasize how much success she’s already had in the field! In 2024 alone, Skiniri won 6 Natural Health & Beauty Awards. When I congratulated Lettica on her accomplishments, she said “It’s been really good. I’m still learning as I go, and there’s a lot of stuff I don’t know, but it feels like I’m on the right path.” Even from the little time I’ve known her, I couldn’t agree more! 

Learn more about Skiniri:

Website: https://www.skiniri.com/

Instagram: @skiniri