Tell us a little about yourself
I was born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I was a nature and adventure child, always spending time outside with the plants and animals. I’d often take home samples of plants/flowers to make into healing muds or perfumes (which I made by soaking in sunlit water).
My father is a veterinarian, and my mother is a creative, so I grew up around science as much as art. As a child, my dad used to put me at his microscope, where I’d look at bubble shapes at 300x or anything else he had on hand, and I was captivated. The world of science meant creative discovery to me, so I gravitated towards it. I studied molecular biology and studio arts in college and went on to research medicinal plants in grad school. I was very interested in ethnobotany, biology, and utilizing the healing power of plants for medicine and wellness. This was the early nineties, so people weren’t using naturals like they are now.
After grad school, I entered the skincare industry as a botanical specialist and product developer with companies like Thymes and Aveda. I moved to NY in the early 2000s and entered the post-grad Fashion Design program at FIT to explore a design interest. In no time, I realized that while I loved design, I didn’t like fashion design and missed working in science. So I dove back into skincare innovation and developed products for companies large and small (including Kiehls, Naturopathica, Marmur Metamorphosis, and smaller indie brands) and started my own laboratory where I research and develop new concepts/products in the area of skin microbiome, biology, bio-design, and sustainability.