Many months have passed since my friend Carolyne sent me a package of dried rose buds from London, allong with some beautiful hand-dyed silk crepe, and hinted that I might make some rose soap for her, but I was a bit anxious about this project and didn't really feel ready to give it a try until now.
Carolyne likes earthly, natural colors and fragrances, so I've been contemplating how to go about making a rose fragranced soap, how would I structure it, which colours should I use, which oils and butters, which essential oils etc.
Finally, I decided to use Rose Perfume Oil that contains some Rose essential Oil in it (because Rose E.O and Rose Absolute were way to expensive to use), Palmarosa E.O. and finally (after I tested the combination in my whipped body butter) Chios Mastic.
I used French Pink Clay for colour, using less than a tea spoon for about 1/4 of 1000 g batch (the darker redish colour) and about 1/4 tea spoon of pink clay per 1/3 of the batch for the lighter pink color. I scrapped what was left of the lighter colour and added some green pigment to it, because I wanted a splash of green in my Rose soap. That was the only synthetic ingredient in this soap (sorry Carolyne), maybe next time I'll use some spinach or spirulina for my green...
Once in the mould, I used a spoon to scoop some of the remaining redish colour on top, together with the green one, then I used a small plastic spoon to give it some shape and finally, I added the rose buds.
Unfortunately, after I added Rose PO in the batch, it evidently caused ricing so I just mixed it like crazy to try and dissolve those little bits, then added colour and poured the layers in the mould fast, all the time thinking "This is it, it's ruined!". It wasn't ruined, fortunately, but as you can see, my secret swirl didn't come out as I planned, probably due to the thickness of the soap.
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| Instead of a coat hanger, I made this contraption using a brass wire from my jewellery making supplies |
I used this wire contraption to do vertical and horizontal swirls, but after I cut the soap there were no swirls to be found :(
I still love how this soap turned out, but I might use pure Rose essential oil next time, to avoid ricing and acceleration.
The fragrance of this soap is so fresh and gentle, it's been two days since I cut it and put it to cure and now all of my kitchen smells amazing.
Uvek je veliki izazov raditi sa mirisnim cvetnim uljima. Imala sam nekoliko frustrirajucih iskustava kada mi se masa prebrzo zgusnula I onda je sapun, umesto da bude lepo nasaran, morao da bude skuvan (HP). Uzimajuci u obzir date okolnosti tebi je ovaj sapun super ispao! Svidja mi se odabir sastojaka a ovi suvi pupoljci sapunu daju posebnu draz. Takodje mi I ovaj sastojak "mastic" zvuci pimamljivo! O cemu se radi? Bas mi je drago da sam otkrila tvoj blog, uzivala sam citajuci tvoje postove! Pozdrav, Goca
ReplyDeleteHvala Goco. Jako mi se dopada kombinacija mirisa ruze i grcke mastike, ali je zaista nepredvidivo kako ce reagovati neki cvetni miris. Mozda je pametno prvo ga isprobati na manjoj kolicini sapuna, ali posto je ovaj bio u pakovanju od 10 ml i nije bas jeftin, odlucila sam da je bolje da pokusam i da mi sapun mirise kako treba, nego da bude slab miris jer nemam dovoljno. Mastika sa Hiosa, ili Mastiha (Μαστίχα) je smolast proizvod drveta Pistacia lentiscus, ovde se cesto koristi u kolacima, posebno onim koji se mese za Uskrs, kao kod nas slavski kolaci. Ima veoma prijatan, osvezavajuci miris, nalik zvakacoj gumi, kao sto mu naziv kaze (ovde se zvaka kaze mastiha), mastika i jeste preteca zvakacih guma jer su je nekada Grci zvakali kako bi odrzavali zube i desni zdravim. Drago mi je sto ti se dopada moj blog, nada se da cu uspeti da jos tekstova prevedem na srpski, ali izmedju pravljenja sapuna, pisanja na engleskom i azuriranja bloga, nikad dovoljno vremena. Moram reci da je tvoj blog u vrhu domace blogosfere sto se tice nase interesne sfere i sapuni su ti zaista prelepi.
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