5 New Soaps..and a lil Sale

Yep! Been busy...and there's still more to come.

In order of appearance (top to bottom), the new soaps are:

Temple Ball - a blend of Petitgrain, Orange, Benzoin (the very thick sticky stuff) and Nutmeg. Inside, what you can see is Coltsfoot leaf, which is know to aid the healing and the itch of eczema. There are random chunks of cocoa-dusted soap inside as well. It smells very fresh with a warm spicy background. 100% Natural.

NonScents - a blend of absolutely nothing. Just pure soap with extra virgin olive oil, organic cocoa butter and organic shea butter. The dark line and the crunchy looking topping is Aussie organic olive green clay. Smells like unscented soap! 100% Natural.

Festival 2011 - a fragrant blend of heady and dusty Nag Champa incense dipped in thick, black Indonesian Patchouli with a puff of woodsmoke. This is my favourite scent at the moment and will be available as bathing grains, SWASH and perfume oil in due course. The colours are yellow, blue and green oxide with Aussie organic red clay and Dead Sea Mud. 96% Natural.

Antiguan Firecracker - a tropical floral blend of Frangipani & Lilac petals lifted with Sicilian Lemon oil and Lavender oil. On the top are deep red rose petals, lavender buds (from my own bushes) and dried Chamomile buds. The colours are aqua, deep red and white to mimic the colours of my Antiguan holiday back in 2007. 98% Natural.

Garden of Cupid - named by Aleyah Jordon who entered our Facebook giveaway (she still hasn't come forth to claim her prize)...so if she's reading!

A blend of Sweet Fennel, Geranium, Lavender, Ylang Ylang and sticky pine resin. The top notes are the fennel and lavender, which then warms to a floral heart. At the end of the sniff you get the fresh pine aroma...but only if your nose is good at detective work. Inside the soap is Juniper Berry meal. 100% Natural.

All will be available from the shop at the end of January....or if you can't wait they're up in the Etsy shop to purchase and finish curing at your end until ready on 25th January.

Oh...before I forget and have to edit this post again...there's a SALE on in our online shop and in our Etsy! Go see x

Thanks for reading!

cookin' up a storm

'cyclone' logs 'cyclone' peaks just 'cyclone'

My balls

packets ready for sending.

I done made this 'Cyclone' soap yesterday. I didn't have a lot of Juniper oil left, and getting hold of some quickly proved difficult (and expensive), so I tweaked my recipe.

This now has a smidge of black pepper, which is actually quite similar to Juniper in that it has a lot of the same components, which make up the essential oil. I shan't go into the blurb and bore you though.

It smells so so nice. A really light, yet biting scent with an ozonic aroma. I have some available still but was running a little low. I add organic shea to the mix to make it extra good for the skin. To purchase one of the cured bars, click here to buy from FuturePrimitive Soap or click here for Etsy purchasing.

I've been quite busy lately with web orders, which is really great. Thanks to all who have ordered. Your soaps are on their way this week. Whilst packing them up, I thought I'd take a few pics to show the finished articles. I really like the way they look now, though I've been contemplating trying some different coloured strings. I've seen the ones I want, I just gotta go get some. I'm really happy with the new paper. It lets the soap breathe, and keeps them fresher for longer. 

Soap Packaging

Something I struggled with for a good couple of years...soap packaging.

I toyed with brown kraft paper, with cello bags (no good as the soap sweats), with thick paper with my logo, with cloth, with muslin...so many things...

I haven't shown the packaging of my soaps for quite some time.

I think the last post I did on this subject included my soaps with the gardeners string tied around them.

I soon tired of that as it's so time consuming when packaging larger wholesale orders.

Finally I allowed myself to agree on these strips, which simply wrap over each soap and are secured at the base.

All relevant info is on each strip.

I like the packaging colours to compliment what is inside.

The paper I have also allows the buyer to see the beauty inside too. Not see - through but near as damn it.

I know a lot of people struggle with packaging so please know that I have too.

I love a simple cigar band myself but when stocking in retail shops I think it's better to have the soaps wrapped.

I must say that Jaq from Soaphora has the most exquisite packaging.

Click here to see her Etsy...it's wonderful soap too!

I've been working hard on new strips for some of the new soaps I have made over the past few weeks. All will be revealed soon...the run up to xmas is just around the corner. I have 3 new soaps to show you very soon....

xx

7 Sins...

Stylin': Deep, dark chocolate cake with fondant icing fingers and cinnamon quills with thick dollops of whipped cream, dusted with mixed spice.

Scentin': 7 sins...of naughtiness. Banana cake infused with Ginger, topped with Vanilla Frosting and drizzled with melted Dark Chocolate. Toasted Madagascan Vanilla bean with a dribble of Honey and finished with a scattering of Hot Buttered Popcorn.

Butterin': Un-refined, dark, organic Cocoa Butter from Kenya.

A bit more....I decided to have a pop at creating a cake inspired soap after watching Kia from Beacon Creations do her thang on YouTube. She has such a flair for creating the ultimate in textured tops and for creating a want for her products inside me so deep that I want to buy her soaps all the time just lately. (i just placed an order...shhh!).

She makes all kinds of different soaps and I love how she talks you through what she's been doing. Her video's also chill me out so much so that I watch them before slumber.

Anyways, this soap is a one off from me. I rarely use 100% fragrance oils in my soaps so this is like somebody else made it. I walk into the curing room and sniff it not really registering that I made it!

I was so happy with the results though, really. Thanks Kia!

At this time of the year my thoughts turn to pastels, to finely iced cakes and to flowers and leaves...and my birthday is just around the corner so I am starting to feel very spring-like and inspired by what's happening around me in the outside world so much that my soap ideas are now flowing for summer soaps.

I have a few from the original line up to make once my Patchouli oil turns up (how I got so low I don't know), then I'll be cracking on with some newbies again.

Hope you like this one.

x

Headline News...in The Telegraph

Hi gang!

Last Saturday we were featured in The Saturday Telegraph newspaper and have since been absolutely inundated with orders, which has enabled me to breathe a huge sigh of instant relief.

Those who know me well know that Matt and I have been under tremendous strain with money and have been holding out for a miracle that will enable us to continue with our little cottage industry.

This may only be short term...who knows...?

But it has enabled me to spend some well-earned cash on a shed load of ingredients so that I can get on with new introductions for 2011. I'm so excited!

If you missed the article on our Facebook page, please click here to be directed to the website 'In The Press' area. If you click 'The Telegraph' you can read it as a pdf.

If you click view you can change the page display to 'two up' so you can read it as it was displayed in the paper.

If any of our new customers are reading....thank you all sincerely from the bottom of my heart for ordering! It means an awful lot.

I've been tweeting and facebooking about it all....so I'm really sorry if I've bored some of my soapy friends...but really, I can't believe the response we had. It's truly incredible and makes me feel very, very happy to know that people really like the soaps as much as I love to create them all.

Next up....there will be a trip back to the archives....SNOWDRIFT soap is making a come back shortly. Those of you who tried it and loved it will be over the moon!

Keep 'em peeled!

xx

Midnight Marauder....

New!

Midnight Marauder was named by my nephew Ethan who is 10.

Inspiration for this ere soap was good old Harry Potter....and Peter Pettigrew.

Sprinkles of brown sugar & dried orange peel are scattered in zig zag lines over the top.

Footsteps run across each soap.

The scent is a combo of warm spices with citrus and sugar.

Lots of essential oils blended with a few choice fragrances.

Made with molasses and dark brown un-refined cocoa butter with a bit of yellow oxide for the flashing.

I was going to incorporate some red to mimic the colours of Harry's preppy scarf but then decided to leave it and keep it looking darker...like something you may find in a shop in Diagon Alley.

Coming out for sale in a week or so. I'll keep you posted.

Hope you are all well.

new batches of regulars

Just cut this morning. I tweeted about this soap seizing on me yesterday. It decided to go on me just as I needed to do my dots. I only just managed to save it, but it didn't come out as good as it normally does. Never mind, at least it wasn't a total disaster.
Because my soap batter thickened too quickly, I had to layer instead of the usual random pours.
I actually quite like the layering. It came out good. Not too perfect.


Herbaceous cut up on Sunday. This soap has such a good scent...even if I do say so myself.
It's a blend of Sage, Rosemary, Thyme, Marjoram and Litsea Cubeba (may chang).
A very refreshing herbal scent with a lemon top note. One of my ultimate favourites.
The colour was created after looking at my trusy Farrow & Ball paint chart...again!
Such a good way to think up colours. This duck egg blue was created with TD, ultramarine blue & chromium green oxide.
A good seller at Capability in Cheltenham. If you're ever in the area, you must visit this little treasure trove. It's a really well thought out shop for gardeners. Michele also does garden design.
I'm so pleased she agreed to take my soap last year. She's done really well for me!


Arabica in it's packaging. Now available to buy online here.
I didn't plan on this soap being as scrubby as it is, but I've been using it for the past 3 days in my bath, and it's the DON for exfoliating the whole body.
I like my scrubby bars ultra scrubby, yanno...so it does what it's supposed to. This does a good job, and smells ultra nice. Sweet orange with earthy base notes. I love this and will keep making it as I think folks will love it.


Remember that tutorial I did for Jo's blog? This is the finished, cut up soap we made.
How did yours turn out? I know a few of you had a go as you've been telling me...so do show us.
Leave a comment with your link on this post if you like. Thanks!


Final pic...Herbaceous logs. I love my batches cut into logs. Just a shame to cut 'em all up.
If only I could bathe with a whole log. I might try one day!

harvest moon...already?

nice balls. nice peaks. A newbie. I dunno why but I had this 'orange' thing going on in my head for a few days, so I thought before I have to re-produce all of my regular range of soap, I'll get this one outta my system. It kept eating away at me. Sometimes, the need to create a new one gets to you. It can sometimes be a chore when making the same soaps over and over....for me anyway...anyone else? So...a bit of pad 'n pen action brought me to an essential oil combo of Sweet Orange, Clove Bud, Patchouli & Ginger. As I write, I'm thinking there's another oil that I added, but I can't remember right now if there is or not! Will have to check my notes...but I can't remember where I put those either. Never mind. They'll turn up. Now, I'm not a fan of ginger when smelling it straight outta the bottle...to me it smells somewhat 'doggie'....or rather like 'doggie biscuits', but when added into a blend in very small quantities I find it very, very pleasant. Even when cutting, this soap smelled divine and after a few days curing the scent has changed a little more into a 'fresh linen'-like scent. Very nice, especially when created naturally. I didn't have a name until I cut it. When I sliced the batch open, the balls looked like moons and the colour looked like harvest hay. So, there was my little soap making up it's own name all by itself. I bring you 'Harvest Moon'. Funny, I used to sell an Echinacea plant called just that too....but it died every time I tried to grow it. Hopefully, this soap will live long...and prosper.