Zahra Karim, Founder of EXOTIC SKN®, has been featured in the University of Westminster’s What It Takes 2025–26 Overview Report following her alumni speaker session, What It Takes to Build a Business with Purpose.
The report records that the event attracted 88 attendees—40 students and 48 alumni—making it the highest-attended event in the four-part series.
From law graduate to founder and speaker
Karim graduated from the University of Westminster with a Law LLB (Honours) degree in 2019.
On 20 November 2025, she returned to the University community as the alumni speaker for a conversation about entrepreneurship, self-care and building with purpose.
Drawing from her journey as Founder of EXOTIC SKN®, Karim explored how self-care can support clarity, creativity and growth. She also shared lessons from building a brand rooted in meaning and impact, alongside practical ways to pursue a career or business with greater balance and authenticity.
The invitation marked a meaningful evolution: from studying law at Westminster to returning as a founder with experience, perspective and something valuable to give.
The series’ highest-attended event
Karim was one of four alumni speakers featured during the University’s 2025–26 programme, which recorded 287 attendees across four events.
Her session attracted the largest individual audience.
The report also includes feedback from an attendee who highlighted Karim’s ability to:
“invite the audience to tap into their inner power and unleash their capabilities in the business world.”
The response captures the wider purpose of the conversation. It was not simply an account of building a business. It was an invitation for others to recognise their own capacity to create, lead and contribute.
Building with purpose
The philosophy behind the session reflects the model Karim continues to build.
EXOTIC SKN® is a London-born luxury lifestyle and self-care brand creating products that bring together performance, considered design and meaningful ritual. Its wider commitment to impact is extended through EXOTIC SKN FOUNDATION®, which advances education and reproductive-health knowledge.
Commercial ambition and purpose are not treated as competing ideas. Both form part of the long-term vision: to build an internationally relevant luxury brand whose growth creates value beyond its products.
Karim’s inclusion in the report preserves a meaningful stage in that journey—a founder returning to the institution where she studied, not only to share what she had built, but to help others recognise what they might build next.
Official sources: University of Westminster, What It Takes 2025–26 Overview Report, pp. 3 and 6; University of Westminster — Students and alumni gain career inspiration at What It Takes talks.
About Zahra Karim
Zahra Karim is the Founder of EXOTIC SKN®, a London-born luxury lifestyle and self-care brand creating highly functional, visually elevated products designed to transform everyday self-care into meaningful ritual. She is a University of Westminster Law LLB (Honours) graduate and first-place winner in the Accelerator category of the University’s Big Idea Competition.