Teach Soap

I'm making some black and white soap for a friend's wedding (they're her wedding colours).

I wanted to make either black spirals embedded into white soap or white spiral embedded into black soap. Which do you think will work best? I've just made a bar of black with sweet almond oil and a bar of white with sweet almond oil and an FO (forgot the FO in the black - d'uh! but I can add it to the embedding soap).

Hubby suggested I do one with black embedded into white and one with white embedded into black... do you think that'd work? I'm concerned you won't see the black embedded into white and it'll just look like black bits in your soap when you use it? I could cut it into slices when it's done I guess but then I'd be losing the spiral effect.

What to do? Any suggestions?

ETA: Maybe it'd be best if I just make chunks and embed them and then slice it? Then I could have black with white embeds and white with black embeds.

I guess at the very least, I can melt it all down again anyways!

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I would think if it's a black bar with white embeds, with that much black it could bleed or stain.
I would make it white with black embeds.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

It was a long afternoon!

I did the curls and they worked ok... but thought they'd look better in clear; I have cupcake silicone moulds but more in a triangular shape than the regular cupcake shape so I made small curls, put them in the bottom (both black and white) and poured over clear melt M&P with added sweet almond oil and Blue Amberwood FO. When hard, I demoulded and it looked a bit meh but my hubby had the idea to trim them to the square at the base of the moulds and it looked really good. I had made one with all black curls and white pour over but put far too much alcohol on the curls and it smelt just of alcohol . I remelted the black in one pan and the white in another and then poured them in layers... the first white layer was too hot and sort of bloomed into the black layer but I kept going and thought what the hell... again demoulded once hard it wasn't much to look at but we cut it to the square and I think it looks really nice (well pretty nice ).

The left over black and white all got chucked into the same pan and made a horrid grey and I thought why not try whipping it (not cos anyone would use it but just to try the technique on something that I didn't want to keep). That was fun and it makes a lot more than the regular pour doesn't it? It's an elephant cry though, not 100% sure what to do with it other than just use it (not to be seen by anyone else!). Any idea for a whipped grey soap? I then thought it's ugh so added a bit of fushcia and got a heather colour. This was still very bubbly and I poured it into regular cupcake moulds - oddly as I poured a skin formed but I kept pouring and the liquid then poured under the skin and sort of led to a raised rounded top. Again they won't be used for anything other than just using.

So basically I spent all afternoon making soaps and ended up with two half decent ones and lots of pretty crappy ones. I'll take some pics of the black and white ones if anyone would like to see them.

I'm sort of feeling a bit down by it though - I have so many ideas and really don't have the techniques to follow them through - and reading is so much more different than actually doing. Also I need a larger range of scents because I'm getting bored with the 5 I have. Feeling a bit meh about it I'm afraid.

Thanks for your suggestion Soapbuddy.

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Sounds like you had a busy day.
If you want to get more fragrances, how about the sample packs from Brambleberry?
http://www.brambleberry.com/fragranceAtoG.aspx

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

Ok here are the black and white soaps which I hope are good enough to send as a little gift (please be honest about what you think!):



And the duds (the heather colour scented with "Milk" and my "Elephant" Soap which I have no clue what to do with!):



Soapbuddy, I wonder what the shipping costs from the US is as I live in Ireland.

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I would send an email or a PM to Anne-Marie and ask what the shipping would be to Ireland.

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Irena
Closed minds are like faulty parachutes; they refuse to open.

I like the black and white soaps. I think they look very cool.

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Haven

Thanks so much!

These are the last I made for my friend... I will be glad not to see black and white again for a long time!

These worked out better up to the point I ran out of clear base!! So I had to use white base for the second half... not too sure about them to be honest, but I've no base left so this has to be it!



I must say they are lovely to use (we're used the cuttings off the side - waste not, want not!), very moisturing due to the sweet almond oil and a lovely scent.

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All three black and white soaps look really pretty! I bet your friend will love them!

Well, they're going off in the post to the UK tomorrow!

Thanks all so much for your comments.

I think I might try something very girly and pink next time

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They are very cool, I have not worked with black as yet, but I think they look nice, should we be more ginger with the black mica than others