CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Self-care plays a vital role in mental health, and it comes in many forms.
What You Need To Know:
- Brittny Horne’s childhood included putting puzzles together with her grandmother
- Horne’s business, RVL Wellness Co, features puzzles for Black women as an option of self-care and a form on hands-on meditation
- The puzzles include images created by three Black female artists
- Horne hopes to change the perception of puzzling through her products
For some, it may involve seeing a therapist. For others, it is taking a short walk around the neighborhood.
However, one Charlotte woman finds peace in puzzle pieces. So, she has created a few of her own puzzles, which provide a little R&R- relaxation and representation.
Many of Brittny Horne’s favorite childhood memories include visits to her grandmother’s house.
“She would always be working on a puzzle,” Horne said. “I would either go in and try to work on it with her while she was doing it, or you know, she may give me a smaller puzzle for me to work on while I was visiting.”
For years, putting puzzle pieces together became a calming tradition for the pair.
The tradition inspired Horne’s new business.
“I literally cannot start working on the puzzle until I have every single edge piece,” Horne said.
Her company is called RVL WELLNESS CO. It creates puzzles for Black women as a fun option of self-care, which is something she says she desperately needed at the beginning of the pandemic.
Horne and her husband moved to North Carolina from Maryland to start a brand new career in tech. She said the stress was overwhelming.
“I really lost myself in the job and just being consumed 24/7 with what’s happening, what do I do, feeling like I having impostor syndrome, feeling like I didn’t belong, like I couldn’t survive, and just having to really dig deep to pull myself out of that,” Horne said.
Her therapist encouraged her to look for ways to detach and relax, which made her think back to puzzling with her grandmother.
“Puzzling can really be looked at as like a form of hands-on meditation,” Horne said.
The idea to offer puzzles to women like herself came to mind, but not just any puzzles.
“I never saw any with people that looked like me on these puzzles. And so, I was like, OK, why don’t I do something that I can relate to that, you know, represents me in a positive way,” Horne said.
She partnered with three Black female artists to create the puzzle images, with names such as Squad, Brunch, and Protect Your Peace.
Horne hopes to change the perception of puzzling and introduce more Black women to the peace she experienced through puzzle pieces years ago.
“I feel like a lot of people, especially millennials, associate puzzles as something they did as a kid, or something that their grandparents did, or something their children do. I’m trying to show people that this is something for us, too,” Horne said.
RVL Wellness Co. also offers puzzle and sip kits, bath bomb sets and even custom photo puzzles.