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Have you always wanted to try making cold process handmade soap, but it always seemed too complicated? We bring you a detailed guide to making pink soap that you can decorate and scent according to your ideas, or you can make the process even easier and completely skip the decoration in the form of Himalayan salt and rose petals.
To make cold process soap, we always need sodium hydroxide and demineralised water. Do not use tap water – due to minerals the chemical reaction of soap formation will be disrupted. Other essential ingredients are oils and butters. We have prepared a finished recipe for you; however, any substitution in it concerning oils or butters will resultin a change of the required amount of lye and water. For this reason, the amount of ingredients is given in grams. If you insist on changing the recipe, it must be recalculated using a soap calculator (many are freely available online). The recipe used 400 g of oils and butters.
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Below you will find a few tips and tricks on how to make soapmaking easier or avoid some mistakes.When working with lye and uncured soap (i.e. soap that has not been cured for at least 6 weeks), always use protective equipment, especially gloves and goggles. If your skin is affected, immediately start rinsing the area with cold water; you can also use diluted vinegar for further rinsing. Use diluted vinegar also to clean work surfaces after you finish (acetic acid neutralises lye residues) and place all tools and containers you have used into diluted vinegar for several minutes, then wash them.When dissolving lye in water, a large amount of heat is generated. Therefore, you can replace about half of the water with ice made from demineralised water as well. The solution will cool down faster. It is a good idea to pour the finished solution through a sieve into the oil mixture, as any undissolved lye granules can be caught this way.The mixture of oil and mica powder or titanium dioxide should also be added through a sieve; this will catch clumps of undispersed colourant and your soap will have a uniform colour.When mixing the soap, use a plastic or stainless steel stick blender. Ordinary metal will oxidise under the influence of lye.Spraying the soap with IPA is helpful to prevent the formation of soda ash (white layer on the surface of the soap), but it is not necessary; soda ash is only an aesthetic defect.To check the pH you can also use a phenolphthalein solution or strips containing it. When using phenolphthalein indicator strips, proceed in the same way as with litmus strips; the strips should not turn pink. If you use a solution, drop it onto various parts of the soap; it should not turn pink either. Pink colour indicates high pH values, and thus unreacted lye; such handmade soap is not safe to use.To create gold veining in the soap, you can first pour only part of the soap into the mould, then sprinkle the surface with gold mica powder (through a sieve) and only then add the rest of the soap.
Below we will introduce the individual ingredients used to make the pink soap for beginners, as well as their alternatives and properties.
For making cold process soap, demineralised or distilled water is always used. Only this water is free from minerals, so there is no risk of undesired reactions of these mineral substances with sodium hydroxide.For this reason, do not use boiled water or tap water.
Hydroxides are necessary for soapmaking. Sodium hydroxide provides solid soaps, while potassium hydroxide is used for making liquid soaps; do not substitute one for the other without recalculating the recipe. Sodium hydroxide is a strongly alkaline substance, therefore always use protective equipment when working with it. Store sodium hydroxide out of reach of children and pets, as well as its solution and raw, uncured soap.
A popular base oil for soapmaking is olive oil. This oil is readily available and therefore found in many soap formulations. It provides mild soaps with conditioning properties. It can be replaced by other vegetable oils, but then the recipe must always be recalculated.
Apricot oil is rich in vitamins and minerals. It has a light colour and therefore does not disturb the shades of the added colourants. It is well absorbed by the skin and thus has universal use in many types of formulations. The same rules as for olive oil apply when substituting it.
To obtain a hard and faster setting soap, coconut oil is suitable. Although it is an oil, this fat is solid at room temperature and therefore combines ideally with vegetable butters to provide hardness, latherand strength to soaps.
You will fall in love with this conditioning vegetable butter in soapmaking because the resulting soaps will have a soft, creamy lather, while being sufficiently hard and durable. Shea butter is, alongside cocoa butter, one of the most commonly used butters in soapmaking, not only because of its propertiesbut also because of its affordability. For soapmaking, its refined version is sufficient, since the fatty acids of this butter will react with sodium hydroxide anyway.
For colouring soaps, mica powders are popular because of their high stability even at alkaline pH. Mica powders give you soaps with stable colour and some of them also with a slight shimmer. When adding them to soap, it is advisable to mix them with a little oil and add them through a sieve to avoid clumps. You have a truly wide range of mica powders to choose from, so do not hesitate to use your imagination.Alternatively, you can omit mica powder altogether.
To enhance the added colourants, titanium dioxide is used. This very white powder helps to lighten the soap slightly so that you need less of the other colourants to achieve the desired colour result. Titanium dioxide should also be added through a sieve to avoid clumps, and you should choose a type suitable for combining with oils. If you do not have titanium dioxide, feel free to leave it out and increase the dose of mica powder by about 0.5 g.
For scenting soaps, fragrance oils are often used because they are light in colour and therefore do not affect the final colour of the soap. You can also use essential oils, but some darker coloured oils can tint the soap. Fragrance or essential oils are often added in excess, as part of them will react with the lye.
As mentioned, isopropyl alcohol helps prevent the formation of soda ash. You can also use it after cutting the soap – spray the fresh cut surface with IPA so that the soap hardens faster and soda ash does not form on it.
For decorating the soap, pink Himalayan salt is an excellent choice. You can choose the coarse variant (in that case, it is good to press the crystals slightly into the soap when decorating so that they do not fall out after hardening), or you can choose the finely ground version. You can also decorate soaps with regular sea salt or other materials.
Dried flowers or herbs are popular materials for decorating soaps. You can choose from a wide range of different plants with which you can decorate your soaps. However, after the first use of the soap, it is good to remove the wet petals from the soap or to let the soap dry thoroughly (do not leave it in contact with water, for example in a soap dish), so that the petals do not mould.
As mentioned, you can experiment with homemade recipes to achieve the desired properties. However, the final result can be influenced by many factors, such as humidity, temperature, quality of ingredients or their storage. Before using any ingredient to make a cosmetic product, familiarise yourself with its properties, recommended dosage, storage conditions and safe handling. Every ingredient can have the potential to cause an allergic reaction in sensitive individuals; therefore, before using the product, we recommend finding out whether you are allergic to any of the ingredients or the overall product, for example by doing a patch test. If you have very sensitive or very acne-prone skin or if you have other skin and health problems, we recommend that you consult a medical professional before applying a new product to your skin, whether it is a homemade cosmetic product, a pure ingredient, or a commercially available product.
Is there any beginner here who has successfully made the pink soap? If you have tried it and are already enjoying the fruits of your work, do not forget to show off and share your work with us on social media or send it to us at marketing@handymade.skWe will be happy about all your emails.
We would like to thank Ivana Jačalová very much for the excellent guide to making pink soap and the beautiful photos.Do you have an idea for another tutorial, or is there one you are missing? Write to us and let us inspire each other.Until then, happy soaping, friends.
