LIONESS WEEKENDER COVER STORY
Black Khakhela, a proudly environmentally-friendly Mozambican brand celebrating natural hair
Carmen Miral is the founder and inspiration behind the growing Mozambican natural skin and haircare brand, Black Khakhela. The brand, created in 2015 by Carmen, started as a social intervention against the preconception that natural / kinky hair is not beautiful or professional. She believed that by exposing this issue and her brand message on social media, “very important people” in different areas (with local and globally impact) using their natural hair would inspire younger generations to respect and embrace their own natural skin and hair.
Lioness Weekender spoke to the passion-driven Carmen Miral, to learn more about how the story of Black Khakhela first started, and what drives its growth and impact today.
In 2017, entrepreneur Carmen Miral started to produce her own range of beauty products in her personal kitchen, as a response to the need for local products that respected and responded very well to natural hair. By 2018, Carmen was invited to be a guest speaker at one of Lionesses of Africa popular Lioness Lean In events in Mozambique and to represent her brand. The response was overwhelmingly positive, and in Carmen’s own words, “it was a boom!” She started to feel the visibility and pressure needed to take the brand to the next level.
In 2020, Black Khakhela improved and expanded its product range, and grew from 2 to 11 products for skin and hair, all with high standards (produced by certified companies).
Today, when people mention the Black Khakhela brand, they talk about it with respect and pride for natural hair. When they mention the products, they talk about the high quality for a Mozambican brand. And they recognize some ingredients from Mozambican culture. 2022 also saw Carmen announce the exciting news of the brand being launched on Amazon and reaching a whole new audience. Carmen says, “Yes, we are dealing with Albert Scott to put our avocado butter onto this useful platform. It is a step we dreamt about when we started.”
Speaking about Black Khakhela’s core values, Carmen adds:
“By making plastic-free shampoo we want to elevate our conscience about taking care of our environment. We value our identity so much and we want people to experience African and Mozambican beauty secrets. Like mafura oil, it is used locally to eat with Cassava, but is used to reduce inflammation on babies massages and helps moisturize hair and skin. In Mozambique we use lemon juice as deodorant, to reduce body smell on our armpits, because of it we use it in our natural deodorant formula. And this deodorant is without aluminum. We make some products specific for kinky hair, like our gel, because we care about inclusion. Our purpose is to deliver the message that our culture, our creativity and awareness is in every product, in each ingredient.”
To find out more about Black Khakhela’s product range, visit the brand’s social media platforms:
