From Our Roots to Your Ritual

Sisters and Lab Our Story banner with parrots and lotus flowers

I never wanted to be an entrepreneur.

I grew up in Dhaka, Bangladesh watching my mother build her cosmetics business from the time I was six or seven. Her first product was henna — for the hair. I still remember sifting it with her, weighing it, packing it into small bags at our kitchen table. Then she would go door to door, finding buyers one conversation at a time.

For most of my life, I didn't understand why she did it. The long hours. The packaging late into the night. I saw the work — and for years, I specifically did not want it.

Motherhood changed everything.

Then I became a mother.

My body changed in ways that didn't resolve. Postpartum hair loss hit me like a brick — a real, isolating thing that arrives exactly when a mother is already most vulnerable. My skin shifted too. My son was born with sensitive skin and eczema that made every new product a gamble.

I went looking for skin and hair care I could trust. What I found were shelves full of steroids, products weighed down with artificial preservatives or harsh ingredients, or formulations so precious they felt out of reach.

I wanted something in between — familiar, natural ingredients; formulations rooted in tradition but held to modern standards; everyday rituals made with care.

I wanted to honor tradition, but also learn from the women around me — moms in my community who had their own remedies, their own nature-inspired solutions rooted in what worked for them. Weaving those together felt like the point. So we made products with components that honor three things: my heritage, my love for innovation in skin and hair care science, and the knowledge shared by local moms who walked this same road.

Sisters & Lab was born.

My younger sister Zoya is studying chemistry, graduating this year. She understands formulas at the molecular level — the kind of foundational knowledge that turns a recipe into a science. Our parents have been formulating in Bangladesh for over twenty years. Our family farm grows a handful of the ingredients at the heart of what we make — the rest we source with the same care, often from the same soil traditions.

Everything we needed was already in our lives. We just had to choose to build with it.

So we did. On our own terms. A separate brand, with a different identity — holistic, considered, made for women who want skin and hair care that works with their heritage, not around it.

How we make what we make.

Eight of our soaps are handmade at our family farm in Bangladesh. Rural artisans — most of them women — formulate them with ingredients grown on the land. The formulations are ours. Created specifically for Sisters & Lab.

The rest of our products — our body butters, balms, face mist, bath products, and the hair oil we're launching this summer — I make in small batches from Dublin, California, with guidance from Zoya and my parents.

If we wouldn't use it on ourselves, we would not sell it.

Made with care and intention.

We were raised in a faith that teaches wealth is meant to be shared. Giving is not a marketing strategy — it is a quiet duty, the kind you do without needing it named.

Our family farm employs women in rural Bangladesh and supports their children's education. Locally, we donate soaps to women's shelters and fundraise for mothers in our community. As this brand grows, so does what we give back. We prefer not to make more of this than it is.