Teya Kepila (also known as @theturmerictimes) is a Brooklyn-based ceramicist and ceremony host who approaches beauty as an expression of life’s fullness – something found in nature, ancestry and the freedom to exist untamed. Growing up in California, with nature as her earliest blueprint and her mother’s holistic healing centre close at hand, ritual has long been second nature. Today, that might mean embracing frizzy hair, no longer angling her face in photos, nourishing skin with plant-based oils, or ending each night with two quiet words of gratitude. Her beauty philosophy is similarly instinctive: less about alteration, more about honouring what is already there.

How do you define beauty?

Beauty is the witnessing of miracles in this finite life that are only apparent when we realise it resides in the parallels of nature and the human body: wrinkles in skin and ripples on the sand on the ocean floor – or the bulging curves in trees and the soft rounds of the body. Beauty feels like proof. The result of fullness in this life.

Who or what was your earliest beauty influence?

I grew up in California and found nature bathing to be the sacred source of beauty that became my blueprint for what I could find beautiful in myself. From there, I found the older women in my life to be such beautiful and strong representations of earth.

What beauty habit have you abandoned with age?

Angling my face in photos. Now I just let myself exist. I laugh, scrunch my nose, and truly have released a worry about what I look like in photos.

Is there anything about your appearance you've learned to appreciate later in life?

Certainly, my body hair. My hair has always been the point of focus for me ranging from the mounds of hair on my head to the hair on my arms, face, and back. I have learned to feel extremely proud of the richness of life that comes from my hair. To me, hair is my Grandma in India with two long thick braids; its rich beauty of ancestors that came before her who took the time to care for their hair and body.

What’s the last thing you do before bed?

I close my eyes and get my body into a comfortable position and quietly whisper to myself these two powerful words. I say them every night before I sleep like a prayer: ‘Thank you’. I have learned there is nothing more important than the ritual of gratitude, no matter the shape or size of how it comes out.

Can you tell me your top five beauty products, and why you love them?

Micellar water, I feel, cleans absolutely everything. It ensures the muck is gone and has become a huge point of reliance on making sure my face is actually clean. Weleda Skin Food Moisturiser. EADEM Lip Softening Balm is my ultimate go-to – even on long runs the balm stays put. I love the Rare Beauty Brow Gel, and lastly, the Tread Well Body Oil – it’s basically food for your skin because all the ingredients are from plants.

What is the strangest thing you’ve done in the name of wellness?

I have done some crazy wellness things – many of which have been through being in proximity to my Mum’s holistic healing and wellness centre that I would take advantage of growing up. I did brainwave optimisation (a technology that reads brainwaves and mirrors it back into audio for your brain to self-correct). I also did this thing called a bio charger where you sit in a room, and a coil shoots out energy to the room.

Do you have a signature scent?

I have mailed my friends' clothing in efforts to keep our closets fresh and fun, and when we do swaps, several times I have been told it ‘smells like me’ in reference to the Nag Champa I have burning. Truly anything musky, masculine, earthy, and woodsy. Typically, I reach for Aesop scents.

What makes you feel most glamorous?

When my hair is frizzy, I feel so glamorous. Something about how being untamed and wild gives ode to a primal occupation of space and territory.

When you’re getting ready for a night out, what’s on your soundtrack?

ABBA – of course! Who else could channel this free, enchanting, and liberated vibe that makes you want to boogie into the night.

Whose approach to beauty do you admire?

I appreciate the approach of beauty where there is emphasis on what someone already has, and there is no goal of altering someone's face in order to fit within a box of social standards based on trending fads.