About Ilgen Paydas
I am Ilgen - the marketing director of Cotton & Olive.
Cotton and Olive is a small online business run by me and my husband since 2012.
We are both born and bred Turkish citizens who have been living in the UK long enough to become British. Our move to the UK was due to a new role my husband has been appointed to for BP UK, back in 2005. It all started with a 3-years contract and it never came to an end. Having raised our 2 daughters- the youngest one is off to Uni this year- we are now fully involved growing our business.
So here we are, proudly presenting our beautifully wholesome
hammam towels and robes, bedspreads & throws naturally complemented by hand-crafted olive oil soaps from my hometown, Antakya, at Southern Turkey, right on the Syrian border. This ancient city -Antioch- has a centuries-old history of soap-making. And the ‘Olive’ bit in our brand comes right from our olive-oil soaps, as you may have guessed. Our journey just carries on naturally mingling our Turkish cultural traditions with the western flavour, creating our unique version reflected in our work. We keep adding new product variations, learning a lot on the way, making plenty of mistakes but never losing the spirit of fun and love for the product.
Thank you for being here and sharing our passion.
Ilgen
Oct/2019