How to Make Perfumed Soap

You can make perfumed soaps easily at home and find most ingredients in craft stores and at your local supermarket. This recipe uses fragrance oils, which are slightly different from essential oils. Essential oils are the distilled essences of plant leaves, stems and bark. Fragrance oils are synthetic and, often, much cheaper than essential oils. Fragrance oils are also not as volatile as essential oils and their fragrances last much longer. The following recipe yields six 5-oz. bars of sandal-rose soap.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Two lbs. of melt and pour soap base
• Two microwave-safe bowls
• Rose fragrance oil
• Sandalwood fragrance oil
• Red soap-safe dye
• Rose petals or buds
• Rubber or silicone spatula
• Spray bottle of rubbing alcohol
• Six-bar soap mold with 5-oz. wells

1. Chop your soap base into chunks, and divide them evenly between the two microwave-safe bowls.

2. Cover the bowls with plastic wrap and heat each bowl, separately, in the microwave. Heat the soap in one-minute increments and stir the soap to help it melt more evenly. You want the soap to melt completely but be careful not to overheat the soap.

3. Add the one-quarter oz. rose fragrance oil to one bowl of soap. Add one-quarter oz. of sandalwood fragrance to the other bowl of soap. Gently swirl the soap, or mix it with a spatula, to blend the scent. Spray rubbing alcohol on the surface of the soap to disperse any bubbles.

4. Add ten drops of red soap-safe dye to the sandalwood scented soap. Swirl the soap, or mix it with a spatula. Spray rubbing alcohol on the surface to disperse any bubbles.

5. Pour the clear, rose-scented, soap into the mold tray--fill each well half way. Spray alcohol on the soap to remove any bubbles.

6. Set rose buds in the clear soap. Artfully arrange the buds in any pattern you like. The number of buds you use depends on the size of the buds and the pattern you create. You can also break up the rose buds and sprinkle the flakes into the clear soap.

7. Let the soap set for one minute, or until a light skin forms. The soap should be firm enough to support the next layer of soap but soft enough that the two layers stick together.

8. Fill the soap wells, the rest of the way, with the red soap. Spray alcohol if needed and put the soap in the refrigerator to harden. It should take about two hours for the bars to fully set.

9. Remove the finished the bars from the mold. If the bars don't release easily, run warm water over the back of the mold. Trim any excess soap from the bars and wrap the soap in wax paper, for storage. Enjoy as you would any other soap.

Tips & Warnings

• Be sure to use soap-safe dye. Candle, fabric and food dyes may irritate or stain the skin.

References

• Melt &Mold Soap Crafting;C. Kaila Westerman;2000
• Perfumes, Splashes and Colognes;Nancy M. Booth;1997

Resources

• Soap Making Resources