Making Natural Soap
Behind the Scenes at the Manor

Soapmaking always starts off with lots of beautiful golden colored olive oil. With this olive oil, melted coconut and palm oils are added. This forms the wonderful moisturizing base which is later enriched with exotic butters and cold pressed plant oils.

Lye (sodium hydroxide) is the ingredient which marries oil and water, turning it into rich, moisturizing Manor Hall Soap. The temperature of the oils and the lye water must match before mixing can begin. Soap cannot be made without lye, and safety equipment is always used when handling it.

The cooled lye water is added to the cooled oils. The mixing is done by hand and away from heat. This is known as the "cold process" method of soapmaking.

The mixture is stirred slowly at first and then it is blended until it reaches a creamy texture. This stage is known as "trace", as evidenced by the trace it leaves on the sides of the pan.

Trace is the stage that exotic butters, cold pressed oils, and pure essential oils are added. Adding them at this late stage allows their benefits to be retained in the soap. Clays and botanicals are also added at this point, for color and texture.

Once the extras have been added and fully stirred in, the large pan of soap is poured into the mold, which is lined and waiting.

This is a batch of Orange Tree Blast. It starts off a very bright orange, but over the next 36 hours, a natural chemical heatup will take place and it will lose its vibrancy. During this exothermic reaction the soap changes to a translucent gel. As it cools it will harden and turn opaque.

Swirling soap takes a little longer. The batch is divided at trace into smaller pans, to be colored separately with natural clays, botanicals or spices. Once colored, the batches are poured into the mold in alternating layers and then swirled with the handle of a wooden spoon.

The soap sits in the mold for 36 hours before it is ready to turn out. Logs are cut against a wire and are shelved for the next 3 to 5 days. Gloves are no longer needed at this stage, because the exothermic reaction has made sure the lye is no longer caustic.

The logs of soap are trimmed and laid across a handy little gadget which cuts them neatly with wires that are about an inch apart. This helps keep the weight of the bars even and is much faster than slicing with a knife.

This is a log from a batch of Ruby Moon, which has just been cut into bars. Natural colors and swirls are very unpredictable, and every batch that is colored or stirred through with swirls has its own personality. Each log is different from the next, and each bar is totally unique.

The new soap bars are put into a tray and carried to the curing shelves, where they are lined up neatly in rows. Here they will stay for the next four to six weeks, during which time they are turned regularly. As the soap cures, the water content evaporates, making for a longer lasting bar of soap.

When the bars are removed from the curing room, they are wiped clean, and each one is individually checked for tiny air bubbles, nicks and dings.

Each clean soap bar is set on its own carefully measured handcut wax wrap. Nimble fingers grip and turn, pressing and sharply creasing each fold in place. Once sealed, the bar is ready to proudly wear its label.

From the humble beginnings of a bottle of golden olive oil. Almost Sunset, the perfect moisturizing end to any memorable day.