Fancy Soap Bars

About three weeks ago, Kim and I taught on of our Advanced Soap Making workshops.  During each workshop we make two 1 kg batches of soap in front of the students.

This is to show them different techniques that they may want to practice and make during the class.

In this class we made two quite exceptional bars; Dragon’s Blood Scrub and a Forbidden Fantasy Scrub.  Both bars contained poppy seeds as a natural exfoliant.

Poppy seeds are much better to use than microbeads as an exfoliant (the latter enters the ecosystem and doesn’t break down) and are mild on the skin.  That and the fact that they breakdown and rot after a few weeks in water.

I love a good scrub in the shower and using these bars are quite invigorating!

The scent of this bar is quite unusual.  So many of our students go crazy over it, but it just makes me sneeze!  Yes I had to tell it like it is.

I think they turned out rather well.  During the class, I perform all the chemistry, and Kim does all the layering and swirls.  She is very creative like that.

Anyway, as the post title suggests, fancy soap bars are what we do.  I love guiding the students during class when they make their own soapy creations.  Some of the patterns and colours are just amazing.

Here’s a video I made when unboxing and cutting up the Forbidden Fantasy Scrub.

 We are also experimenting with natural clays as well and hope to offer another class that is all about making soap with 100% natural ingredients.  As it’s under development we’re not sure when it will be available.

So, what do you think of our soap?  Have you made any fancy soap bars of late?  What process do you use?  Melt and Pour, Cold Process, or Hot Process?  Which one do you prefer and why?