Cleopatra’s Rituals: Sensuality, Sovereignty, and the Origins of Intimate Care

MAY 13, 2025 | MARISA GOLDSTEIN

A ritual isn’t a trend—it’s a return.

When we talk about self-care and our ten-step skincare routines, ice rollers, vitamin mixes and eye masks, it’s really easy to roll your eyes about it when you’re talking about them as just steps you follow. The real magic happens when you make it about more than a routine, instead, defining them as a ritual: daily acts of devotion that nourish our body, clarify our mind, and sustain our soul. 

For Cleopatra, the last pharaoh of Egypt, these beauty rituals were not luxuries. They were tools of power, preservation, and presence. It’s said her baths were perfumed with rose petals and mixed with milk, her skin anointed with healing oils, and her entrances choreographed by scent alone. Shakespeare imagined her sails drenched in rosewater, carried to Rome on winds “so perfumed that the winds were lovesick with them.” She did not rule only with intellect, charisma, but also a deep understanding of sensory influence. 

Beneath her tales of reign lies something quiet, universal: a powerful woman attuned to the rhythms of her own care. A belief that intimacy—sensual and personal—was not something reserved for others, but cultivated within.

Rituals You Can Practice

These rituals can live on in the quiet, conscious ways we care for ourselves today. Rituals, after all, are not about grandeur—they’re about intention. And intention can live in your bathroom, on your vanity, and in the palm of your hand.

Here are some modern rituals that we do inspired by ancient wisdom—moments to reframe care as connection:

After the sun.

A day outdoors can leave your skin flushed and your energy scattered. Take a moment, touch your skin. Putting on oil becomes a cooling, calming veil—restoring hydration and comforting sun-touched skin with botanical calm.

To start the day.

Just before you get dressed, take a moment to wake your body before emails and expectations hit. Reserve ten minutes for an intentional stretching practice in an area away from your workspace. Massage your skin, we prefer to use oil –– a few drops massaged into the collarbones, lathered on your arms or inner thighs becomes a sensual check-in and invigoration.

To close the day.

After a shower, after movement, after everything—find moments to exhale. Sit, close your eyes, create a cue to unwind. To re-enter softness. A gesture that tells your body: you’re safe to rest. Afterplay Oil helps not only with physical cues, but olfactory ones. Its scent tells you to return to your ground.

In transition.

Whether shared or solo, a few drops of oil can mark the shift from day to night. Anticipation. Aliveness. Transition. Preparing for a date. Recovering from a difficult conversation. Grounding after travel. From to-do list to touch. Let the scent and slip of it signal presence. This is the kind of product that doesn’t ask for a perfect mood—it creates space for whatever you’re feeling.

Ritual doesn’t have to be reserved for the sacred. It certainly should not be reserved for sex alone. Because sensuality is about much more than that. Start by feeling good in your skin.