Province Apothecary

After living with eczema her whole life, and having doctors prescribing her with steroids and cortisone, Julie Clark had had enough. She knew there had to be something natural to help her skin condition and was determined to find it.

“I just had this intuitive feeling that there was more than what we were doing already,” she recalls. She left her costume design and styling career to enrol in a holistic health practitioner school in Toronto. At a time when all-natural, chemical-free skincare was unheard of, she found a school in the Beaches that specialized in holistic skincare and aromatherapy. “I learned how to make all the products and give treatments, and just within a few months of using all-natural skincare and learning about all the ingredients, I totally improved my skin,” she says.

What started as her personal journey, turned into an at-home business. She began providing facial treatments and custom-blended products out of her apartment to family and friends. Her friend who owned a store at the time asked her if she could carry her products, and then she began selling them at flea markets, too. Word spread and by 2012, her business had grown into Province Apothecary. Stores began hearing about the buzzworthy holistic brand and before she knew it, she was selling to over 70 stores across North America.