The gorgeous smell of a good soap
DELICIOUSLY FRAGRANT, NON- DRYING, LOW ON PACKAGING AND OFTEN ETHICALLY MADE, SOAP COULD WELL BE THE FUTURE OF WASHING. THIS WAY TO THE BAR!
Something seismic has happened in the world of soap. Sturdy, unpretentious blocks of handmade soap have replaced their brightly coloured and over-scented predecessors. A new breed of independent soap makers is creating bars with natural oils and fragrances that won’t dry out skin, aren’t full of petrochemicals and don’t involve animals in their making or testing. Packaging, when used, is minimal. Whereas liquid soap or face wash come in plastic containers, these bars of soap are either unwrapped or tucked inside brown paper or cardboard boxes. Suddenly, buying and using soap is as pleasurable as selecting a wedge of cheese or a crusty roll from a farmer’s market.
These chunky blocks of soap feel right for our troubled times, offering good honest cleanliness at a reasonable price. Small batch soap companies, such as the Friendly Soap Co and All Natural Soap, pride themselves on their integrity, not just of their ingredients but in their manufacturing. These soaps are made using the cold-process technique, which maintains the properties of its natural ingredients, destroyed at high temperatures during commercial soap-making. It also retains glycerin, removed by the big soap companies to use in other products including moisturiser. The extraction of glycerin, a moisturising agent, causes soap to dry out the skin – one of the reasons so many of us stopped using it.
Rather than the overly scented soaps of yesteryear – chemically created, pungent blends of lavender, hyacinth and rose – makers like Heyland & Whittle use essential oils, herbs and pure colourants like madder rose and turmeric. Margatebased Haeckels incorporates locally harvested seaweed into its vegan block, and contemporary household goods company Feldspar uses charcoal in its Ash bar along with coconut and olive oils.
Soap-making has fine and noble history, stretching back to 2800BC in Ancient Babylon when someone must have cleverly realised that mixing oils and fat with ash or clay (an alkali) produced soap and glycerine. Back then tallow (rendered fat from sheep or cow kidneys) was the main fat ingredient; olive, cocount and palm oil came later. Nowadays, environmentally-conscious soap manufacturers have jettisoned palm oil, aware of its link to mass deforestation, for other vegetable oils.
In the UK, soap became fashionable during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, when the bathing craze
“BUYING SOAP IS NOW AS PLEASURABLE AS SELECTING A WEDGE OF CHEESE”
“MODERN BARS OF SOAP ARE EITHER UNWRAPPED OR TUCKED INSIDE BROWN PAPER”
saw its consumption boom. In 1853, a soap tax was introduced, rendering it a luxury item seen solely in the washrooms of the rich. Mass-production began towards the end of the 19th century when the newly discovered relationship between health and cleanliness prompted the Lever brothers (now Unilever) to manufacture soap on a large scale.
Worldwide, soap production – much like wine making – is closely associated with the surrounding natural environment. In Spain, the hard white Castile soap is made from olive oil and soda; Aleppo soap is made from Syrian laurel oil and lye (an alkaline solution); Marseille soap includes seawater and sea plants from the Mediterranean; and Nabulsi soap is made on the West Bank, Palestine, from local virgin olive oil, water and an alkaline compound.
When choosing your soap, it’s best to check the label or dig around on the website first. If the soap is organic it will be free of chemicals; vegan soap will be free of animal products including honey or milk; a Cruelty-Free logo will guarantee it’s not tested on animals. These days there is a soap for everyone, whether you are after a Korean golden ginseng bar (£18, Binu Binu), a slice of Gourmet Olive Tree soap from (Lush, £10.20 for 100g) or Wild Nettle and Sage soap, £9, from Soap Co (made by people who are disabled or disadvantaged).
All of which is a far cry from the days when hands and faces were scrubbed with carbolic Coal Tar Soap ( prized for its scouring anti-bacterial properties), or dehydrated by ‘guest soaps’ that, infuriatingly, never seemed to get used up but instead loitered for eternity in the soap dish, sitting in a soggy puddle. Truly we are in the golden age of soap.