A New Alchemy: Katrina Markoff’s Violet Flame

For those new hear, we’re Relish—a creative studio born in the Balkans, bridging Skopje and Chicago.

In our line of work, we meet incredible founders, creatives, and visionaries—people building brands that push boundaries, reimagine traditions, and introduce something entirely new to the world. Many of them have ties to this region. Many of them have stories that deserve to be told.

But there hasn’t been a platform to celebrate them. So we decided to create one.

This is the first in a series of interviews spotlighting brands and creatives connected to the Balkans—exploring how creativity shapes their work, how heritage and innovation intersect, and what it really takes to build something lasting.

And for our first conversation, we couldn’t have asked for a better subject.

Katrina Markoff—a second-generation Macedonian, currently based in Chicago—built Vosges Haut-Chocolat, a brand that redefined chocolate and earned global acclaim. Named one of the 10 Best Chocolatiers in the World (National Geographic), honored by President Obama, and celebrated by Fortune & Bon Appétit, she’s a true pioneer in food and branding.

To be honest, I was a little intimidated.

This was my first time sitting down for an interview like this, and I stumbled through it more than once. But from the moment Katrina started speaking, I understood why her work has resonated with so many.

She doesn’t just make chocolate. She distills meaning into everything she does.

Her newest venture, Violet Flame, isn’t just about indulgence—it’s about presence. About what happens when we stop, taste, and actually feel.

Body Over Mind

We live in a world that moves fast.

We scroll, we consume, we optimize. We forget to taste.

For years, Katrina built Vosges Haut-Chocolat on the belief that taste is more than pleasure—it’s memory, emotion, transformation. But as Vosges became a global name, Katrina felt the pull to create something more personal.

“I was following outside voices more than my own,” she admits. “I wasn’t tuned into my body’s intuitive voice.”

Growth changes both the founder and the brand—and sometimes, they need to take different paths.

That realization led her to Violet Flame—a brand that isn’t just about chocolate, but about coming back to yourself. About slowness. About instinct. About tasting like you mean it.

A Sixth Sense

Katrina describes her process as a portal to intuition.

“As I reconnected with it, I discovered that tasting chocolate in a particular way—through deep sensory immersion—became a gateway to my sixth sense, my intuition. By fully engaging one or more senses, I entered a state of gnosis, where the quieting of the mind didn’t just bring stillness but unlocked something greater: the active imagination, carrying a message waiting to be revealed.”

Violet Flame gets its name from a 15th-century French alchemist who described seeing a violet-colored light in his third eye. It wasn’t a flame that burned—it was a flame that purified, clearing negative thoughts and replacing them with clarity, renewal, power.

Katrina felt that shift herself.

To her, fear is energy—neither good nor bad, just fuel. The only question is: will it paralyze or propel?

And for her, that choice began with slowness.

Slowness is countercultural. We live in a world that rewards speed—optimization, efficiency, momentum. But what happens when we slow down?

That’s the fire behind Violet Flame.

Flavors of the Balkans

Now, Katrina is looking ahead—not just to the future of Violet Flame, but to the origins of flavor itself.

She’s thinking about the foods that shaped her, even from a distance. Her family is Macedonian, and while she didn’t grow up in the region, she feels the pull to reconnect—not just with the place, but with its ingredients, its terroir, its essence.

Perhaps a Macedonian-inspired chocolate collection. A sourcing trip to explore flavors that have been part of her lineage for generations.

The Balkans are full of ingredients waiting to be rediscovered. Apricots, almonds, wild herbs, mountain honey. If you’re working with them, we’d love to hear from you. Because if Katrina finds what she’s looking for here, it could be the start of something special (consider this your cue to share this article with your diaspora group chat).

The Lesson in All This

My conversation with Katrina kept bringing me back to one of Brian Collins’s core philosophies. As one of the most influential minds in branding, he put it simply: “People don’t fall in love with what you make. People fall in love with why you made it.”

Violet Flame is an embodiment of this—which is why I have no doubt it will resonate.

It’s Katrina’s personal experience—her search for reconnection, her journey back to herself—distilled into something we can taste.

She’s taking her expertise as a chocolatier and applying it to something bigger than indulgence. She’s using it to solve a problem we all wrestle with: staying present in a world that constantly pulls us away.

And she’s inviting us to taste her own transformation.

 

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Words: Dimitar Popov
Graphics: Anastazija Manasievska