Published 16:43 IST, December 24th 2019
DIY Soap: Easy and hassle-free ways to make your own soaps
DIY Soap: Simple techniques that you must try if you want to make your own home-made and chemical-free soaps. Here are some simple techniques to try. Know more.
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Making your own soap at home is easy, economical, creative, and fulfilling. There is something satisfying about taking a bar of your own homemade soap into the bath or shower. Whether you are looking for a more natural alternative to commercial soap or are just a crafty person looking for a new creative adventure, making soap is fun and not too complicated.
Why make my own soap?
Where the hard pastel-coloured bars sold at the drugstore are anonymous and indifferent, homemade soap has character. It charms, it smells good, and feels good and is also comforting in ways which manufactured soap can never be. If you have never tried a bar of real natural handmade soap, you are in for a treat. If you have tried one, and know just how wonderful it is and you will be surprised that making your own soap is not as difficult as you think.
Making soap is a basic chemical reaction
Soap is the result of a basic chemical reaction between fats or oils and lye. By carefully choosing a combination of quality oils, adding your favourite fragrance or essential oils, and swirling in a lively colourant, your soap suddenly takes on that charming character that commercially manufactured soap can’t even begin to compete with.
Two methods of making soap
Melt and Pour: A process in which you melt pre-made blocks of soap and add your own fragrance.
Ingredients:
- A countertop or other clean workspace with a microwave or double boiler
- A heat-resistant bowl for the microwave
- A couple of spoons or whisks
- Some melt and pour soap base
- A set of measuring spoons
- Fragrance, colour, or additives, as desired
- Something to mould the soap in
Cold Process: The most common method of making soap from scratch with oils and lye.
Ingredients:
- A flat, uncluttered workspace with a heat source and access to water
- Some animal fats or vegetable oils
- A pitcher of lye-water
- A soap pot and some other easily found tools and equipment
- Fragrance or essential oil, as desired
- Natural or synthetic colourant, as desired
- A mould to pour the raw soap into
- A cool, dry place to let the soap cure
14:45 IST, December 24th 2019