Friday, August 14, 2009

The Soap Creation Process

There is something about making soap, the creative process, that is inspiring. I love picking out the ingredients, the scents, the additives, and blending them together to make something unique and beautiful!

I am constantly asked about the soap making process, so I thought I'd take a few pictures along the way! This is our Mint Tea Handmade Soap. I didn't take pictures of every step, but took pictures of the more interesting ones! LOL!



I started by measuring out my oils and lye solution. I then added Green Tea Powder to the lye solution (as evidenced by the brackish muck in the pictures below!).


Once the oils and lye solution both cooled down, I added my essential oils to the oils (peppermint and rosemary essential oils for this batch). Then I added my lye solution to my oils and blended. This batch, because of the botanical ingredients, as well as the essential oils used, it tends to heat up very quickly. When oils & lye are combined they naturally produce heat. Certain ingredients can add to that heat. I always have to watch this soap carefully, or it will volcano up out of the mold on me!

But once the solution has achieved a light trace, I pour it into my pre-lined molds.


I then sprinkled green tea leaves onto the top for texture and aesthetics.


And after the soap mixture has thickened a little more in the mold, I took a knife and added some texture to the top of the soaps.


After several days, the soap is ready to cut into bars. They then sit in my curing rack for 3-6 weeks till they are fully cured. Once cured, they are wrapped and labeled, and ready for some lucky buyer to purchase them!!!


Each soap is a little different, with different scents, different colorants, different additives. They are all beautiful, they are all unique, they are all special in their own way!!!

6 comments:

Becca said...

Brilliant! I have always wanted to try soap making, & I love to see the process done. Still loving our soaps we ordered from you - especially the Orange Citrus soap. Thanks!

Calgon Bath Products said...

This is a good and informative posting. Thanks for sharing, I like it. About Bath Products

Unknown said...

I've seen your lip balm tip on Soap-Queens blog also. Great tips and tutorial. Thanks for the info. I love to make soap!

Alyssa and Tyler said...

Hi!
I was wondering if you are making any special fragrances for the upcoming holiday season?
I write for Utah Valley Magazine and I am looking for fun things made in the valley to feature in our next issue. This caught my attention.
Do you have an email address or some way that I can contact you?
Thanks!

Body Language said...

We have several holiday scents in our shop including Gingerbread Dreams, Spiced Cider, Mint Chocolate & Christmas Pine. We also feature our Gingered Orange Spice during the Fall. We have a Harvest Spice Soap that will be debuting this weekend at the Harvest Market at Sundance. Mulberry will also relaunch at the same time.

I have plans for at least one more seasonal soap, I actually was just about to measure out the essential oils for it!

You can view our shop at www.blsoaps.com or you can email us at lindsay [at] blsoaps.com

Wild Sage Lampwork said...

I would love to learn how to do that... do you give any kind of class or can I come watch? :)

LinkWithin

Blog Widget by LinkWithin