Our Mission
Helping you reconnect with your creative side and reduce your stress and anxiety through the mindful, calming activities of baking and reading with our book-inspired baking kits.
Meet the Team
Hi, I’m Amanda, I’m chief bookworm and head baker around here, and I love helping people like you reconnect with their creative side through imaginative baking. I’m properly obsessed with bookshops and cookies, and I don’t think I’ve gone a day without coffee since I was 14.
Together with my partner, Chris, we’re the duo behind Bookish Bakes.
Throughout my life, baking and reading have been the main ways I de-stress. Whether I was freaking out over university exams or missing my family and friends back home, I would bury myself in flour and sugar or escape to Hogwarts.
Baking requires focus to measure out ingredients and follow a recipe. It allows space for my brain to relax and stop whirring around with negative thoughts. Similarly, reading a good book has the same effect. I can get lost in an author’s world for just 30 minutes and reemerge calm and de-stressed.
In 2020, when my anxiety flared up a lot with the pandemic, I turned to these two activities more than ever. I even started combining the two! I would see an intriguing dish in a book I was reading and try to imagine what it would be like to bake and eat it in real life.
That’s when the idea for Bookish Bakes took hold.
We designed Bookish Bakes baking kits to be a sensory experience that completely immerses you in the world of the book. Every sense – smell, sight, taste, sound, and touch – is activated when you use our boxes to create a fun and unique reading experience that also reduces stress and anxiety.
We hope you love our products and that they provide you and your loved ones with a few hours of relaxation in your busy life.
Our Values
Creativity
In a world obsessed with 30-second videos, side hustles, and instant gratification, it’s more important than ever to find some time to get into the state of flow. Creative pursuits, like baking, require focus and concentration, silencing our prefrontal cortex so that we can feel more and be less critical. Time spent being mindful and creative can increase positive emotions, lessen depressive symptoms, and reduce stress and anxiety. As adults, we often sacrifice time for personal creative projects and for ourselves, but it’s also the time in our lives when we’re at our most stressed and anxious.
Our subscription boxes provide a way to claim that time back every month. Baking is an incredibly healing activity and a wonderful stress reliever – a tactile experience that uses all of your senses to create something beautiful from raw materials. Plus, it’s one of the only methods of therapy that you can eat afterward!
Connection
Providing a way for our customers to connect more with the books they read is so important to us. Our boxes provide a sensory experience that connects you to the book in a unique way. Every sense – sight, smell, taste, touch, and sound – is activated by the experience of using our boxes and allows you to become completely immersed in the world of the book.
Baking too is a mindful activity that allows you space to reconnect with yourself and heal your mental state from our hustle culture. It can also connect you with others by sharing the fruits of your labour and discussing the books!
And of course, we love to connect with our community and customers and provide a space for others to connect with each other. Bookish Bakes aims to foster a safe space where every book loving baker feels welcome and wanted.
Joy
Aside from being a great way to relieve stress, baking is also incredibly fun!
Getting messy in the kitchen should be enjoyable and the resulting product fun to eat as well. Our boxes provide an immersive experience that continues beyond the act of baking. Use your imagination to step into the world of the book and feel like you’re a part of it as you read and indulge in your freshly baked treat.
Responsibility
Every company has the duty to run a responsible and sustainable business. From the way we interact with our customers and community, to the packaging we use, to the suppliers we work with, Bookish Bakes aims to be as transparent and circular as possible.
All of our ingredients are sourced from partners with transparent supply chains and are made without the use of chemicals or additives that you can’t pronounce. Where possible, our meticulously tested recipes are also refined sugar free so you can enjoy a guilt-free baking experience.
We also look after the planet by using recyclable and biodegradable packaging, pre-loved books, and reusable recipe cards.
You can read more about our sustainability efforts here.
