Making Handcrafted Soaps

There are a few different methods of making handmade soap bars. One of the most popular is called "cold-processed". Soap makers who use this method have to calculate the proper amount of lye to mix with the oils and fats they wish to combine that will create a proper soap bar. It is most common to use 3%-10% less lye than is needed to saponify the oils in order to create a soap bar that will not be irritating to the skin due to excess lye. A soap maker must also be careful in their measurements in order to use enough lye to actually create soap. Any small miscalculation during this process could result in a soupy mix of oils, or a bar of soap that could burn the skin.

To explain this process is not that difficult. Once you know the exact measurements of the ingredients you need it is possible to combine your fats and oils with your water and lye solution once both sets of ingredients have reached a temperature range of 100 to 110 degrees. After this is completed the mixture needs to be stirred until it has reached a stage called "trace". Trace can be explained as the state where when you can drizzle the soap mixture over itself and see it forming lines or patterns on the top layer. More or less "tracing" the pattern you are drizzling. Once this stage has been reached, its almost time to form the soap bars in a mold.

Once the soap has reached its trace stage, it is a perfect time to add your fragrance oils, essential oils, colorants, and other soap additives you wish to combine. Some essential oils and fragrance oils can discolor soaps so that needs to be taken into consideration when coloring.

After you have scented and colored the soap, you can pour your mixture into your molds for shaping of soap bar loafs. These molds should be covered and kept in a room temperature area and stored for anywhere from 1-2 days. During this time the soap will continue to saponify. The soap will go through a few different phases while in the molds, it will gel and go from a creamy color to a semi transparent color while the soap making process continues.

Finally you can remove the soap loafs from the molds and start to cut them into soap bars. These bars need to be cured for another 3-5 weeks depending on how much water is in them. This helps create a hard long lasting bar, and also helps balance the pH.

Overall cold-process soaps are very smooth in texture and visual appearance. You will see many cold processed soaps with unique swirls of colors, layered designs, solid colors, or loafs with embedded designs in the loafs. This is a very common and popular method of creating handmade soaps