Lykke & Lumen (lifestyle brand rooted in emotional wellbeing)
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Lykke & Lumen is the new ritual-led restorative wellness brand whose founder, Marie Louise Falktoft, experienced her own burnout symptoms having spent over 30 years in the beauty industry. Alongside working across commercial areas of the skincare industry for global brands, Marie Louise trained as a beauty therapist running her own clinic and through her own personal wellbeing challenges decided to amalgamate all her knowledge in Lykke & Lumen: a brand ‘created to offer small rituals of restoration.’ I caught up with her to find about nervous system recovery, Nordic culture, and the power of sensory experience.
‘I spent 14 years with Estee Lauder and Clarins before that as well as the personal experience of working hands on in my clinic,’ begins Marie Louise. ‘Having experienced burnout, worked through my own nervous system recovery, I realised how many others were living in a similar state of overstimulation, emotional depletion and sheer exhaustion.’ So Lykke & Lumen was born: ‘not as a clinical wellness brand but a collection of rituals and products that help invite those moments of calm back into daily life through sensory experience, touch, scent, and mindful application.’
As someone who has experienced extreme stress and cortisol induced psoriasis and have found the benefits of soothing the nervous system, I was interested to hear Marie Louise’s knowledge around the effects of stress on the skin (neuroscience has proven that stress can soak through the skin surface). ‘There is a growing understanding that the skin is incredibly responsive to stress. We often see it in dehydration, sensitivity, dullness, inflammation or simply a feeling that the skin is out of balance. My approach was to create products that support the skin beautifully, while also encouraging a slower, more intentional ritual around the experience of using them,’ she continues, ‘For example, scent plays an important role across the range – not as fragrance for fragrance’s sake, but as part of the emotional ritual. Lavender, chamomile, sweet orange and grounding botanicals were chosen not only for their skincare benefits, but because they create sensory cues that help encourage relaxation and moments of pause,’ she adds, ‘Touch is another important part of that philosophy. Applying an oil slowly, pressing a mist into the skin, taking a few deeper breaths, massaging the face or body. These simple sensory rituals can become powerful signals to slow down and reconnect with ourselves.’
The philosophy behind Lykke & Lumen is the merging of Marie Louise’s dual sensibilities, ‘her Danish heritage and upbringing and her husband’s French culture,’ so blending the Nordic calm way of living ‘hygge is in my blood’ with French ease and sensuality. She explains, ‘For me hygge is about emotional care not how it has now been translated into the mainstream as ‘a look or style’,’ therefore the Lykke & Lumen range also includes ritual tools and mindful living products: Gua sha, comforting heat wraps to journals, mind cards, books and scented candles with wooden wicks, ‘the sensory calm of the soft crackle reminds me of the warmth and shelter of my Danish upbringing.; ‘it’s about creating a wider world of sensory experiences that help invite stillness and a gentler relationship with ourselves.’
So, what are the Lykke & Lumen skincare formulations that aim to work with the skin microbiome, support the skin barrier and invite a moment of inner peace?
‘So much skincare today is focused purely on correction or results, I wanted to combine proven performance with emotional care,’ explains Marie Louise. Choose from mini bottles of goodness, such as the Overnight Renewal Oil, Relax and Reset Mist, Radiance and Renewal Face Polish, Calm and Restore Body Oil, alongside Collagen Renewal sheet mask, Deep and Balance Sheet Mask, and a variety of gift sets created around targeted concerns.
The first product created Overnight Renewal Oil contains a carefully blended formulation created around nine botanical oils to nourish, support skin working overnight deep into the layers of the epidermis. Sweet Almond Oil (nourishing, rich in Vit E), Wheat Germ oil (supports collagen formation), Rosehip Seed Oil (essential fatty acids for skin renewal), Starflower Oil (hydrating and rebalancing), Ho Wood Oil and Rosewood Oil (supporting skin tone and texture), Palmarosa Oil (maintain skin hydration), Mandarin Peel Oil (radiance boosting), Neroli Oil ‘There is at the top of the formulation an aromatic layer (neroli, rosewood, sweet orange) that is intentional to transform the oil into a sensory experience.’ In other products you will find delicious ingredients like French Lavender, Himalayan Cedarwood, White Grapefruit and Magnesium. The Relax and Reset Mist is a mini bottle of goodness that works carried in your bag during the day to give yourself ‘a portable pause’ with lots of Hyaluronic acid for plumping, hydrating, regenerating and other calming ingredients ‘it is weightless enough for skin that may already be stressed, dehydrated or sensitive.’
Lykke & Lumen is 100% vegan and cruelty free, all botanical ingredients are herb, plant, flower derived with small batch productions and UK manufactured; ‘We wanted to treat transparency as an ongoing commitment not a destination,’ and all packaging is fully recyclable.
So what are the future plans? ‘One of the most exciting developments are my new fragrances,’ she explains ‘my husband is a biochemist so encouraged me to work on blends, I have finished three each one inspired by a feeling and a moment.’
These are Pause – inspired by the Danish art of hygge and the beauty of everyday stillness. Sel Nordique – inspired by the sea (my husband grew up by the Normandy coastline, me by the sea in Denmark) so it reflects that bracing freshness of coastal air, mineral woods, the water’s edge. Calme de Soie is cocooning, sensual and elegant. These fragrances will first launch in July as candles with wooden wicks and shortly afterwards as diffusers.
Marie Louise completely embodies her brand; to even speak to her is to feel calm and a sense of safety, ‘my vision has always been bigger than just home fragrance or skincare alone. I want Lykke & Lumen to become a lifestyle brand rooted in emotional wellbeing.’