Made from Margate: inside Haeckels skin care laboratory

Friends visited us this weekend in Margate, and, having chatted to the patient, sun-bleached men who run the swing boats on the beach, reported varying views on whether the town was… ‘changing’. Meanwhile I visited Haeckels, a business that seems to me to represent the best of what might be changing about Margate.

Haeckels margate

It’s a skin care and fragrance shop-cum-laboratory where all the products are ‘made from Margate.’ Dom, the enthusiastic and knowledgeable owner, collects seaweed from Thanet’s chalky, empty beaches, to make into beauty products and scented candles. He told me that he feels we’ve lost trust in this island’s capacity to give health via our indigenous plants, preferring instead to seek the natural in more exotic climes like Bali.

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