Failor - Making transparent soap: the art of crafting, molding, scenting & coloring

making transparent SOAP

the art of crafting, molding, scenting & coloring

catherine failor

The mission of Storey Publishing is to serve our customers by
publishing practical information that encourages
personal independence in harmony with the environment.

Edited by Deborah Balmuth and Robin Catalano
Cover design by Carol Jessop, Black Trout Design
Cover and interior photographs by Giles Prett except those by
Jeff Burke and Lorraine Triolo for Artville on pages 83 and 85;
Eyewire Images on pages 17, 20, 82, 84, 97, 103, 120, and 134
Illustrations by Terry Dovaston
Text design and production by Mark Tomasi
Production assistance by Susan Bernier
Indexed by Barbara Hagerty

2000 by Catherine Failor

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages or reproduce illustrations in a review with appropriate credits; nor may any part of this book be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or other without written permission from the publisher.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Failor, Catherine.

Making transparent soap : the art of crafting molding, scenting, and coloring /

Catherine Failor.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-1-58017-244-8 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Soap. I. Title.

TP991.F262 2000

668.12dc21

99-055700
CIP

This book is for my parents, Letitia and the late
Robert Failor, for their love and support.

Many, many thanks go to my good friend Kay Whaley, who has been a constant source of inspiration, ideas, and support throughout the writing of this book.

A grateful acknowledgment goes to Elaine White for her time and valuable suggestions.

A few years ago, when she started work on The Natural Soap Book, Susan Miller Cavitch called me up for help. What little help I could offer has been returned many times over through her kind encouragement. Thanks, Susan.

Thanks to John Toso at Sappo Hill, my best friend in the soap business.

To the Portland Public Library I cant count the times I called the reference desk. What would life be without our libraries?

Many thank-yous to all these helpful people: Clyde Abston, Charlie Schmalz, Luis Spitz, George Whalley, Ed Paladini, Peter Cade, John Prutsman, Jim Bronner, Ken Peterson, and Peter Fox.

Zilch. Thats how much informed, practical information on transparent soap-making is currently available to the amateur soapmaker. Why? Not because the process requires a Ph.D. in chemistry or exotic and expensive chemical ingredients impossible for the layperson to obtain. It doesnt. If you can follow a recipe from a cookbook you can make transparent soap, and you dont need to look much further than your supermarket, drugstore, and liquor store for all the necessary ingredients.

Opaque soaps have been manufactured for at least two thousand years, but transparent soap is a relative newcomer the first bars were produced almost exactly two hundred years ago. So information regarding its manufacture hasnt been circulating for as long or as widely as information concerning opaque soap. The descriptions that do exist are scanty and often confusing. And as is typical with many manufacturing processes, trade secrecy has constricted the informational flow down to a dribble. Its just not in the best interest of Neutrogena or Pear to publish a detailed treatise on transparent soapmaking.

I was in business 5 years as a soap-maker before attempting to make transparent soap. It was a bit overwhelming. All the information pertaining to the manufacture of transparent soap resembled a jigsaw puzzle with half of its pieces missing. But the challenge was there. Several months of trial-and-error experimentation ensued, and most batches ended up in the garbage can. Finally came the day when information and observation joined to create the big picture. Thats what this book contains all of the relevance with, I hope, none of the confusion.

Soapmaking is a lot like cooking. The ingredients are measured, mixed, heated, and poured into pans or molds. If your kitchen contains the basic utensils needed for cooking, youre all set. The spoons, whisks, spatulas, and pots used to make chicken soup or bake a chocolate cake can be used to make transparent soap. An accurate scale is something you might not have, but that can always be borrowed from a friend or purchased secondhand.

Transparent soap consists of the same base that opaque soap does animal or vegetable oil combined with lye. Lye usually elicits a strong reaction from the uninitiated. Lye??? You mean theres lye in soap? Lye is a poison!!! But the chemical world is full of beasts turned beauties its just a matter of marrying well. Lye combined with oil is no longer lye, and oil combined with lye is no longer oil. Soap and glycerin are born.

Transparent soap contains a few things that opaque soap doesnt. These arent mysterious chemicals with impossible-to-pronounce names. In fact, youre sure to have one of the ingredients sitting on your kitchen table ordinary granulated sugar. Another additive, 190-proof grain alcohol, or ethanol, might be tucked away in the liquor cabinet. You probably wont have a bottle of glycerin on hand, but its easily found at most drugstores.

I hope this will be enough to dispel any initial reluctance you might have about making transparent soap. After all, every bath and body retail chain on the planet is making it, so why dont you? I guarantee that handmade transparent soap will feel softer, richer, and creamier than any commercial brand on the market.