Loving Natural Liquid Soap

Bare Naked Body natural hand and body soap has been selling like hotcakes! I hand craft each batch of liquid soap with Margaret River olive oil and luxurious coconut oil – that is all. It makes a fabulous, mild, cleansing and soothing liquid soap and  lathers well, without leaving a gel-like residue often found with commercial liquid soaps.

I have been making cold process soap for many years now and at the beginning, the thought of making liquid soap was quite daunting. Now that I have been making liquid soap for over two years and I actually think in some ways it I prefer it.

The only similarity  to cold process soap is that in liquid soap you also add lye to oils. With liquid soap, it takes a much longer time to trace (particularly the liquid soap I make, which has a large amount of Olive Oil) which can be up to one hour. Then you need to cook the soap in the crock pot after it has traced. The whole process takes around four hours and you have to stir the cooking liquid soap every 20 to 30 minutes. I quite like being at home and doing other bits and pieces while I watch my liquid soap, stirring occasionally. Maybe it is because I love being at home…

I like the warming of the crockpot, the stirring of the gel/toffee like liquid soap and the relaxed pace at which the whole process moves. Cold process soap can often trace quickly and you really have to move fast to add clays and essential oils and then pour into the mold and then achieve the right pattern or look. On the other hand, I find making liquid soap serene, relaxing and very grounding.

Once the liquid soap paste is cooked and tests clear, it is diluted to form the liquid soap. I like to dilute very slowly to achieve a lush, golden liquid soap (which reminds me of honey).

I make three varieties of hand and body natural liquid soap, the most popular being Refresh, which is zesty with Litsea Cubeca, Sweet Orange and Cedarwood essential oil. My personal favourite is Lavender and Palmarosa and then I have one unscented, which people can scent themselves, or for those with sensitive skin. 

Custom Soap cutter!

Finally, I have saved my pennies and invested in a custom soap cutter ! Now all Bare Naked Body soap bars will be uniform in size...

I am officially in Love !

Here is as example of the stunning bars they cut -

Natural Soap Colourant - experiment Part 2

So I have been experimenting with some additional natural soap colourants – Madder Root and Alkanet Root Powder. See last months entry for Part 1 where I added Madder Root and Alkanet at trace to the soap.

Part 2 of the experiment was infusing the oils with madder root and alkanet and then using the infused oils to make soap. Here is a picture of the jug used to make the Alkanet root powder infused soap (yes, I know the jug is red – after lots of small batch soap making recently, it was all I had available, as I usually use white jugs!) I was so excited to see the lush purple hues come through - naturally!

I could not wait to unmold the infused oil soaps!

Here is the Alkanet root infused oil soap - 

It does look a little more mauve in real life, but not Purple and definately not as purple as what was in teh jug above. I think I might need to insultate a little more to ensure the soap goes through gel to bring the colour out. It is winter in Australia and rather cold! Still, I do love the Alkanet Root Powder soap and the depth of the colour, however, I wonder whether it will lather purple? I will let this soap cure for four weeks and them report back, as to the colour of the lather.


Here is the Madder Root infused oil soap - 

The Madder Root Powder infused soap is lovely, but again, for this kind of colour, I do prefer the warmth that I achieve with natural clays.

VERDICT – I will not be introducing Madder root powder into Bare Naked Body soaps, as I prefer the depth of colour and effect I achieve with Clays.

I will be doing further experiments with Alkanet Root Powder infused oils and soaps as I really want to achieve a natural purple colour! Stay tuned for further purple soap soon!


Lisa P

Loofah Love

I have been looking at a big box of supplies I ordered for over a month now and all the goodies in there temp me to get my soap mojo back and start creating again. I have had a steady range of luxury soaps for a few years now and really want to start  expanding and experimenting with some different product lines. 

These beautiful, natural loofahs have been staring me in the face for a while, but today – today we make them into Loofah soaps! 

I wanted to try two different techniques in the pvc pipe - one lined with baking paper and the other not lined.

I have used one of my favourite soaps - Green French Clay - and it not only looks calming, with the pale green contrasting the loofah, but is super nourishing with added sweet almond oil, rice bran oil and sunflower oil. 

Here is the soap hand cut with a very sharp knife. I love the patterns the loofah makes!

I cannot wait for this soap to cure four to six weeks, to give it a whirl in the shower and get rid of all that dead Winter skin!

Lisa P

Olive Oil & Goats' Milk

This all natural, Olive Oil & Goats Milk bar is great for sensitive skin and many of my customers use this creamy bar for their children or babies, with great results.

Soothing... with Lavender Buds and Organic Calendula Petals on top.. mmm

Recent market photos - Bare Naked Body Soaps

It turns out that everyone likes natural soaps! One of the biggest Bare Naked Body supporters took some excellent photos of us at the Christmas Upmarket and sent them through to me...

The Bare Naked Body stall was busy all day and here I am selling a bar of Goat's Milk and Lavender - which was one of the best sellers on the.... this and the Refresh bar.

I also displayed the Bare Naked Body logo carving, which I had hand carved when I was in India a few months back. It looks great and I love the craftsmanship which went into it.