The history of Maison Aimi

Hi, I'm Charlotte, the founder of Maison Aimi.

I created Maison Aimi because I have long wanted to find meaning in my work, a job that would allow me to fully express myself through my creativity and what I love. A project that also makes sense for our well-being and our planet. 🌱

I have always been passionate about Asian culture, and Japanese culture in particular. I have long dreamed of creating a project around this passion. I have also always had a great interest in the field of well-being, food and health around natural solutions.

Mugicha is for me the very embodiment of "Japanese health", of Japanese lifestyle too. This drink is so full of potential and yet so little known in France. So I am keen to make you discover it. ✨

How did I come up with the idea for Maison Aimi and mugicha?

Employee burnout and questioning

After years of studying to find myself, after a master's degree in digital marketing and 2 years of design, my first permanent job presented itself to me as an opportunity to grow. I took it and I'm very happy about it. I learned a lot, and about myself too. But after a while, I feel that I'm no longer aligned, that I have to build my own path with my own rules.

In June 2021, after a sort of burnout from employment, I left my job.

I dreamed of one thing: freedom. Freedom in space and time, but also creative freedom. To create my own profession and my own rules. The salaried job was over for me. Just thinking about it gave me anxiety.

A period of questioning and reassessment follows.

A dream of freedom

I dream of freedom but how to achieve it? What do I want deep down? For about 5 months I try different paths, I try to learn to know myself, to understand what I really want. After a while I still don't know. I try things, freelance in communication, cooking, design and then I feel that the sauce is not taking. I struggle, I feel a loss of motivation.

At the same time, at that moment, I know that I also have a dream in mind for a long time, that of going to Japan, immersing myself for 1 year in this culture that fascinates me so much. But it is the beginning of 2022 and no sign of opening the borders. So what to do in the meantime?

I had been dreaming of creating my own profession for a long time. It was time.

The trigger: creating your own job around Japan

Still in the quest for this famous professional project that would thrill me, one day I listened to a podcast that a very good friend of mine sent me saying "listen, you'll like it".

It was about a girl who was about my age, with a similar background except for a few differences, and who suddenly realized that she didn't want to continue like that, with a plane ticket in her pocket, flew to Japan to launch her brand related to Japanese culture back in France.

She decided to create her job from A to Z. And I recognized so much of myself in her: her desire to have a job that allowed her to discover all the facets of a project instead of struggling to specialize, her desire to combine her passions and interests, health, well-being but also languages, international, the discovery of other cultures, and in particular for me, Japan.

In short, I had a lightbulb moment and I said to myself, "BUT THIS IS ME. I HAVE TO DO THIS."

Mugicha and a desire to transmit a Japanese lifestyle

So from there, I simply said to myself: "Charlotte, what struck you when you went to Japan and what do you miss in France? What do you want to share? To pass on?" And then it was obvious. What struck me in particular there was this culture, this habit of having tea available everywhere and at any time of the day, served hot or cold. There it was almost a substitute for water and it was HEALTHY. And it conveyed so much of this Japanese state of mind that fascinates me. But I didn't want to get into tea which was already very established in France and above all, I wouldn't have had the impression of bringing something new.

And that's when I think of mugicha : this drink that I drank in Japan, pleasant, thirst-quenching, without caffeine, without theine, without sugar and rich in benefits, that was what I wanted to transmit, this culture.