This Was Made By A Black Woman: Ep 1- Elements of Aliel

Welcome to the first installment in a brand new series here, called This Was Made By A Black Woman, highlighting Black Woman business owners, innovators and creatives.

Owner/founder, Lakeisha Mitchell-Entsuah and daughter, Leila

I cannot think of too many people whom I have personally had the privilege to meet and work with to start of this new segment than Lakeisha Mitchell-Entsuah, creator of the brand Elements of Aliel. We met some time last year during a ministry opportunity at our church and came to discover that we were both on our own entrepreneurial journeys and the rest is history.

When asked about why she started Elements of Aliel, Lakeisha says, that necessity was indeed the mother of invention, or in this case, motherhood was the mother of invention. "For me the need arose when I became a mother. It was a great time in my life, it changed everything including my skin. It had always been sensitive yet now, the things that used to work were no longer effective."

"I had two main criteria," Lakeisha says, "...first it had to be completely chemical free. The second criteria was it had to be affordable, after all babies are expensive. After months of trying brand after brand, I decided the best thing to do would be start from scratch. Once I had a formula that worked for me it didn’t take long for family and friends to notice. That’s when I decided to take my personal journey public. Today I am proud to have created something that can work for everyone." 

The inspiration behind the brand's unique name? Lakeisha gives all the credit to her daughter. "Aliel is Leila spelled backwards and it is the elements of who she is and who I hope she will become, that forms the foundation of who we are as a brand."

But about these products, though? I recently had a chance to try Elements of Aliel's Arise and Shine, both coffee (yes, COFFEE) infused products and I am now hooked. 

Shine is a body butter with the heavy hitters you need to keep that skin smooth and glowing like shea butter, palm nut oil, babassu nut oil and castor seed oil as well as vitamins A and E.

My favorite is the Arise product which a multifunctional product that not only polishes your skin using ground coffee beans (umm yes!), but cleans it with another product I am in love with, black soap. 

Using both of these together, these have kept my skin GLOWING this summer. The Arise product polishes and cleans my skin (and wakes me up by making my ENTIRE bathroom smell like coffee) , and the Shine product lightly moisturizes me and keeps me shorts and tank top ready.

Check out Elements of Aliel, Lakeisha's backstory and their beautiful product line.