Teach Soap

I ran across this cold processed soap on Pinterest and Etsy. The seller says it's cold processed and each bar is hand-molded. The soap is called Novel Soap and it's sold by Sorcery Soaps, to give proper credit.

I have often wondered about the possibilities of what I could do with soap in a clay-like consistency, but didn't think it was possible. Now I run across this, and I'm foaming at the mouth to figure it out!

Anyone have ANY idea how it was done? I have a thousand of my own ideas running through my head if I knew the technique.

Also, I hope my picture posts properly, it's my first time trying!

My guess is they made different batches then built the final soap from the still very soft & moldable curing soap. That would be a heckuva lot of work. is it super expensive?

No, it was a decent price, $6.50 a bar. I would definitely pay it, especially knowing what goes into creating something like that. I do polymer clay, so I understand from that what time it can take, or experience, and I can only imagine how good you have to be to work with soap, as it doesn't stay the same consistency for you like polymer does until you are ready for it to change. Soap does it's own thing.

Which, of course, is why I wanted to try it, because I am one who is not happy unless my craft makes me really, really mad. If I can't scream and curse at it and feel like it's mocking and mastering me most of the time, I'm Just. Not. Satisfied.

So I will get a pound of test batter and let it thicken, don the gloves and go to town. You guys be prepared for some horrible newbie pictures. Haha!

I saw it on FaceBook. She painted the bookmarks with mica.

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

Ok so!!! I'm getting my lard recipes to behave so that I think I can try to attempt something like this now. I've been busy Frankensteining my recipes and seeing which ones will work best for clay-like work and which ones won't. It seems a simple recipe with lard works best.

Off to phase two now. Yippee!!! I'm pretty tickled so far!

I don't know how this particular thing was done, but I've done some experimenting lately of my own.



I did this by using using finished soap, fresh out of the mold (maybe about 16 hours old? but definitely finished the saponification process) similar to how you would use fondant, gumpaste, or even fimo clay. The soap is still really squishy at this stage, so I rolled it out, cut out pieces with cookie cutters, then shaped them with my hands. It's pretty labor intensive though.

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~Kelly~

That's pretty Kelly!
There is also a log mold and individual silicone molds that make pretty roses.

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

Thanks Irena! I've seen various rose molds, but I don't have any. This was mostly a "I have some leftover soap batter from another project, what can I do with it?" spur of the moment kind of thing. But I liked how it came out!

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~Kelly~

Thanks Kelly! That's basically what I have been doing, is letting batter first sit like you would as if readying it to decorate the tops of soap with cake deco tips, and that doesn't seem to work too well. Then I tried to unmold some leftover soap batter extras out of a mold and the bottoms ended up being not quite ready, but the perfect consistency to be claylike. So maybe soon I'll have horrible clay things to post.