Moonsteam Alchemy is my line of whimsical vintage- and fandom-themed lip balms. It was created by me, Sara, and I make all the balms myself & design all the labels. MSA has been around since 2010, first starting life on Etsy. I stopped selling after a couple of years, though, as I pursued other things & life got in the way.
Then Etsy started changing & changing & changing, and I no longer wanted to sell there. But I missed selling the balms!
I’d wanted to bring MSA back for years now, but this or that reason kept it from happening…but here they finally.
Visit the balms on their own site here! :)
But how did I get into selling lip balms in the first place? Random, right? Here’s the story…
How it started: Geek Bliss
Back in 2009, some friends & I had an idea to start a geeky ezine around our shared interests (more about my geekiness is on the About the Balm Maker page). We came up with a bunch of ideas for the ezine, and we also came up with ideas for items to sell…and I came up with the idea to make & sell themed lip balms. I honestly can’t remember why lip balms, hahaha! But in a creative burst, I got some starter stuff & began making balms.
Everyone loved them, and I loved making them. I said hmmm, maybe I should toss ’em onto Etsy & sell them on their own, not connected to the ezine, and I came up with the name “Geek Bliss.” The shop is still technically on Etsy, although I’m not using it now (Etsy’s changes & all that). I had a lot of fun with the shop, though, and I loved coming up with ideas for different balm themes. I made them based on the TV shows & books I liked, but back then I felt my geeky interests were pretty narrow, with a small audience of like-minded people who’d even want balms based on TV shows or books, so it was just a fun little side thing. But I really loved designing the labels, even though back then I was limited to having them printed on small circles. But they actually worked out pretty well!
Here are some old images of the original Geek Bliss balms from 2009:
From geeky to vintage
While in the course of coming up with ideas for Geek Bliss, I had ideas for vintage-themed balms – I’ve always been as much of, if not MORE of, a costume drama geek than anything else (one of my favorite movies is A Room With A View, which I first discovered in the early 90s & decided I wanted to be Maggie Smith or Judi Dench when I “grew up,” and that sentiment still holds – I want to be like them when I’m the age they are now: fabulous in my 80s!). I decided to do a second Etsy shop, but needed a new name. After brainstorming lots of possibilities, I came up with the idea for “Moonsteam Alchemy”…it was late at night & I was transforming stuff into new stuff & I liked steampunk…and, well, that’s what my brain came up with late that night in early 2010. :)
Away I went designing new labels:
Funny trivia: The Airship Cocktails tin was featured in the Etsy email once, back when they used to highlight a couple of shops each week.
The MSA shop was on Etsy for a couple of years, and is also technically still there, just not selling anything. When I stopped selling, people kept asking me if I was going to reopen, and I still made balms for friends, but I didn’t sell them in a shop anymore.
Until now. :)