GentlerThymes's Profile

Bio

We are a small family based business that makes handcrafted cold process soaps and other personal care products. We've been making and using our own soaps since 1995. We make the majority of our soap in small batches by the cold process method. Cold process made soap is not the same process as melt and pour soap, which is heated, melted and poured into soap molds. We make our cold process soaps using oils, such as olive, canola, tallow, soy, food grade oils, castor, coconut, palm, palm kernal oil, shea and cocoa butter. These natural oils make for rich, creamy suds.

Tallow is rendered fat from beef that makes a very hard, long lasting bar with mild lather. We personally prefer tallow and/or milk, honey and beeswax based soaps We love tallow soap because it makes a mild pleasing, hard and long lasting bar down to the last sliver, but we also make all vegetable based soaps for those who prefer a bar with no animal products.

We use additives such as butters, oatmeal, milks, honey, beeswax, herbs, spices, silk, natural colorants, essential and fragrance oils and label our bars with the ingredients used.

We hand cut each bar and every batch we make varies, which makes each bar unique. Each bar is "cured" for a minimum of 3 weeks and we test each batch before we will sell it. We do not test on any animals.

Cold process soapmaking consists of the blending and saponification of 3 basic ingredients - water, sodium hydroxide (caustic soda) and oils, along with natural additives, without having to apply any additional heat to the process.

If these bars are kept well drained between use, they will be longer lasting then the store bought soaps you might be use to using.

Our soaps are rich in glycerin, as we do not remove the naturally occurring glycerin that results during saponification. Hand made glycerin rich soaps tend not to be as drying to the skin as the detergent based soaps on the market.

Although we do use lye (caustic soda or NaOH) as an ingredient, during saponification it is neutralized when combined with the oils and becomes soap. No lye remains in the cured soap bars.

We use both essential oils (all natural) and fragrance oils (synthetic and/or sometimes with natural components added) to scent our soaps, and the list of ingredients will acknowledge which is used.

We sometimes add skin safe natural ultramarines, oxides and FD&C colorants.

Our soap is made in 25 pound batches at a time or less, cut into logs and then into individual bars.

Our soap is not sold until it has cured for a minimum of 3 weeks. This allows for some of the water used in the process to evaporate and make a harder bar and also to complete the saponification process.

We occasionally supply small soap samples to our customers who purchase from us, but at this time it is not cost effective for us to send out free samples to everyone.

If you have any questions about our products, please ask. We'd be happy to answer.

We hope you enjoy your purchases from our etsy shop.

Female

Favorite Materials

oil, fragrance, aromatherapy, essential oils, lavender, citrus, scents, cocoa butter, oatmeal, silk, herbs, spices, soap