Maitreyi Ramakrishnan’s Secret to Healthy Hair? A Time-Honored South Asian Ritual.
The actress and activist, 24, opens up about her lifelong hair-oiling ritual, grandma-approved beauty secrets and her new ‘dream’ collab with Fable & Mane
NEED TO KNOW
- Maitreyi Ramakrishnan is the new face of Fable & Mane’s 2026 global campaign
- The campaign, “Where All Rituals Begin: From Ancient Lands to Modern Hands,” promotes the brand’s Holiroots hair oil
- The Never Have I Ever star tells PEOPLE all about why values hair oiling and the South Asian holistic beauty practice of Ayurveda, a ritual that’s been a part of her routine since childhood
Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, 24, has been oiling her hair since she was a little girl. It started as something her great-grandmother, grandmother and mother would help her with when she was a child, and now, as a busy actress, she continues to keep the South Asian cultural beauty practice alive.
“There’s never been a time in my life where I didn’t know hair oiling was a thing,” Ramakrishnan tells PEOPLE in an exclusive interview. “Growing up South Asian, your life as a young child is all about taking care of your skin, taking care of your hair, making sure you’re eating good, healthy things.”
Best known for her role as Devi in Netflix’s Never Have I Ever, Ramakrishnan’s most recent career move is joining forces with South Asian hair company Fable & Mane as the face of its 2026 global campaign titled, “Where All Rituals Begin: From Ancient Lands to Modern Hands.” Filmed entirely in India, she is the sole star and narrator of the campaign’s video, which is centered around the brand’s Holiroots hair oil.
“It’s the closest thing I can get to my grandma’s handmade oil,” she tells PEOPLE.
Ramakrishnan typically oils her hair twice a week before washing it. And if she needs a refresher in between washes, she’ll apply a small amount of the oil to her ends. Apart from their hair oil’s similarities to her grandma’s, Ramakrishnan tells PEOPLE, “I just truly love the brand.”
“It’s a very organic collaboration for me because I genuinely have been using Fable & Mane products for years, and consistently. I’m the kind of person, when I start using something, I’m pretty consistent with it.”
When asked about her Fable & Mane campaign filming experience, Ramakrishnan says it was a true bucket list experience.
“It was my first time in Mumbai which is really cool, and it was beautiful,” she says. “It was really nice to be able to have such a collaborative process with Fable & Mane, to create this story and this narrative of this girl who’s making the oil from all the nature around her.”
The film follows Ramakrishnan as she collects all of the necessary natural herbs to create the Holiroots hair oil. She’s shown paddling down a river, walking through a beautiful forest landscape, and then crafts the oil by hand in a spacious cave.
Apart from promoting one of Fable & Mane’s best-selling oils, the goal of “Where All Rituals Begin: From Ancient Lands to Modern Hands,” is also to celebrate the South Asian practice of Ayurveda, or holistic beauty.
“It’s these ancient rituals that have been used through generations that have proven to be some of the best cores and foundational bases for haircare, skincare, and really everything wellness,” says Ramakrishnan.
“For the longest time, Ayurveda was always seen as something that isn’t legit, it’s not ‘scientific’ enough for the Western world. But there is a lot of truth to it and now that the Western world is catching up, it seems like they want to catch up but discard who was the creator, who was the original doer.”
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At its core, Fable & Mane’s foundation is built around acknowledging and honoring Ayurveda’s South Asian-origins, something that Ramakrishnan is happy to align with.
“They’re letting people in while always giving credit and I think that’s such a beautiful thing that I think a lot of companies should employ in their own ethos,” says Ramakrishnan. “The collaboration is truly a dream collaboration in that way, that those morals line up. I believe in that product.”
