Description
LAVENDER SOAP – My Favorite Soap
I remain obsessed with Lavender, it just makes me happy.
Gentle Cleansing Lavender Soap with real Lavender
This soap has lavender buds for a little exfoliation and long lasting scent and real essential oil, no fragrance ever! My soap base makes a nice bubbling, conditioning bar that is hard and creamy made using Olive Oil, Coconut Oil, Sustainable and Organic Palm Oil, Castor Oil, Organic and Sustainable Palm Kernel Oil, Beeswax, Lavender Buds, Lavender Essential Oil and purple Mica.
Before making soap myself, my favorite soap was Trader Joe’s Bisous de Provence Lavender with flowers. BUT the ingredients are a little less impressive than I’d hope for. The first two ingredients are sodium palmate and sodium palm kernelate which is okay as that just means they are normal real soap except these are made using only palm oil and palm kernel oil that is neither sustainable or organic. Palm Oils are among the least expensive oils in the world but their contribution to soap can be very beneficial. Purchasing sustainable and organic Palm Oil does increase costs and I don’t think we should be buying any other kind. The third ingredient is water, that’s okay obviously. The fourth ingredient is fragrance NOT real essential oil. Fragrance is less expensive and has a longer shelf life. Fifth ingredient is the lavender buds, which I love in my soap! Sixth ingredient is sodium chloride, meaning salt, which thickens soap and hardens it. Seventh ingredient is Glycerin which is odd because Glycerin come from natural soap making. They may be making the soap in stages, the palm oil and the palm kernel oil are manufactured separately into single ingredient soaps. During this process the glycerin is extracted which can be sold separately which would explain why they may have to add glycerin back to the process later.
TRIPLE-MILLED: I suspect each manufactured soap is “milled” (chopped up) separately – which might be part of the “triple-milled” description, and the process dries them of water and removes the glycerin so they become hard dry soap flakes. Then these two dry shredded soaps are added back into a slurry of hot water, glycerin and a little shea butter (not much though – as little as .6% is possible – because it is the eighth ingredient of 10.) Milled Soaps tends to be more condensed and last longer but because most often they are made using expensive milling machines, they are made by large manufacturers who often place profit before quality. |
The ninth ingredient is a chelator called tetrasodium EDTA which lengthen shelf life by binding metals, preventing rancidity and reducing soap build up caused by minerals reacting to oils in soap. The final ingredient, etidronate, is also a chelator performing a similar task as tetrasodium EDTA. One possible reason for having two ingredients that do the same thing is you can keep Shea Butter higher on the list and not the last ingredient. This is actually my biggest problem with this soap is that the label brags about it being “enriched with Shea butter” when the Shea butter percentage is likely to be very low.
So, while I think my previously favorite soap is still a lovely soap that lasts a long time and holds on to its fragrance, I now prefer my own.
FRESH SOAP FROM SMALL BATCHES
My soap is made from scratch in small batches so I don’t need chelators or long lasting fragrances.
NO FRAGRANCE
I use real essential oil which doesn’t need to be on a shelf for two years.
HIGH END OILS
My first two ingredients are Olive Oil for its incredible skin conditioning qualities and Coconut Oil for it’s abilty to clean, create nice big bubbles while keeping the bar hard and long lasting.
Importance of using Sustainable Palm Oil
The reason palm oils are so often found in soap is that they are such perfect oils for soap making, balancing all the qualities most people want in a soap without crazy high prices. But cost isn’t the reason I choose to use sustainable and organic palm oils. No matter the price, it would be very tough to find a better oil for soap.
In fact, it is difficult to find an oil that has less impact on the eco-system then palm oil – which isn’t to say the Palm Oil Industry doesn’t need vast improvement – it does. It has a long way to go but I believe it is on the path to improvement. That’s why I choose to pay more money to support palm growers who are members of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and who are certified organic. I worry that choosing to make soap using a more costly but inferior oil could potentially shift the problem to an industry that has even less oversight then the Palm Oil industry does.
I purchase my Palm products from this a company who is a listed member of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) (https://www.rspo.org/members/2312/CFC-Inc-dba-Columbus-Vegetable-Oils) and a certified supplier of organic oils (https://www.usda.gov/topics/organic).
The World Wildlife Fund supports this and asks us to support Palm Oil certified by the RSPO. They do not believe that substituting Organic and Sustainable Palm with other oils is good solution as Palm supplies more oil on less land while producing more benefit for the environment than other oils.
Bubbles are Best with Castor
I use Castor Oil because it is the only oil that provides so much creamy, conditioning, bubbly goodness in such a little amount. When it comes to soap, it is truly a miracle worker.
Beeswax makes a good soap great. It hardens it and adds conditioning creaminess to a bar. I struggled to find a vegan option here, wanting to provide soap to those of us who do not use beeswax but the other solutions didn’t work or were too chemical for my tastes. I try to source my beeswax from small, local beekeepers whenever possible. Beekeeping is a necessary industry to growing vegetables and beekeepers must be able to support their efforts through the sale of their harvest. Most beekeepers I have met love their bees and tend to them carefully and humanely. I would like to support these type of beekeepers.
I always add precious oils to my specialty soaps after the saponification process so the best oils are still available to benefit your skin in their original form.
I prefer naturally derived smells and at least half of my soaps use only natural essential oils.
If you love the scent of lavender, you might like my lavender lotion!
henry jarosinski (verified owner) –
Barbara Cohen (verified owner) –
maria jarosinski (verified owner) –
great lavender scent not medicinal perfect!!!.
Anonymous (verified owner) –
Shannon (verified owner) –
Kristi L. (verified owner) –
Kim Danahy (verified owner) –
Rhonda (verified owner) –
Anonymous (verified owner) –
This soap smells amazing! It helped me relax and revenged after a very stressful day. If you like lavender, I highly recommend you try this soap.
Sara Leibelshon (verified owner) –
Pleasant scent, good lather.
Tess (verified owner) –
Scent is spot on
Bonnie S. (verified owner) –
Was a little disappointed because the lavender scent was very light….otherwise it lathers nicely n leaves skin feeling soft.
Mayra Hernandez (verified owner) –
Beautiful esthetic and smells wonderful. I will be reordering these soaps to cut out other ones full of chemicals.
Karin Haver (verified owner) –
Michelle A. (verified owner) –
Haven’t use it yet but the smell is great and excited to use it soon.
Megan G. (verified owner) –
Purchased for Christmas gifts, smells great!