soaps
To be honest with you: It is not my key competence to make soap, respectively scented soap. (I use transparent glycerine soap) It reminds me a little bit of making scented candles: Likewise, crafting scented soaps is quite different to making perfumes. First, you have to be very careful not to use material that is sensitive to alkaline environment. Like you put in the most magnificent flower and what comes out after a week or so is a dark-brown foully compost pile. Not everything you may use in perfumes works in soaps. And then, the soap should smell nice in a linear way for a couple of weeks, meaning: It should not change its scent too much when being used. And then, you do not want a soap scent to stick to your fingertips for the rest of the week…..but nevertheless the soap should smell nice and radiantly give away its encapsulated scented treasure, and thus, be present enough to fill a bathroom with scented waves….like waves of mandarins with an ambergris touch.
In French this translates into “mandarines ambrées” (I think so at least; the translation has not passed the W.-factor’s French teacher control yet!).
I can tell you: It took me a while and quite some fiddling around to get this ambergris hint, the little woody vibrant touch that I wanted to be there, lifting the green mandarins without transforming the bathroom into Givaudan’s Okoumal production facility. In a sense, the ambergris line shall bring out the colours, point the nose to a mandarin that is fresh, green, clean.
Les Mandarines ambrées have survived an extensive bathroom test for weeks in Zurich, they pleased the eye and the nose and the skin as well. Now we wait for a time slot to pour some more for x-mas…
(Picture: Clementine, seen in Zurich, on my little Clementine tree)
Next post: Munich II, but only if we are lucky as I have to go to Brussels tomorrow morning
November 20th, 2007 at 9:36 am
This is such a cool idea!!! for Christmas presents! I was thinking that in case I run short of ideas I can always bottle some of my perfumes but it would be much nicer to have the soap - esp. when liquid, it can come in various fancy bottles which can be part of the present. Ingenious Andy!!!
November 20th, 2007 at 12:41 pm
I can smell it from here…
How delicious.
And messy !
Have a glorious day, my men.
November 20th, 2007 at 9:22 pm
Ooooh, what a thoughtful gift from a perfumer. I can tell that mandarin smells just as you want it to. It’s always nice to see photos of your clementine tree. Our little orange tree is covered with fruit. They’re all green still. I’m wondering what will happen because supposedly citrus doesn’t sweeten up this close to the coast, but I remind myself that you enjoy the zest of your clementines. We’ll have zest at least. Happy travels.
November 21st, 2007 at 11:06 pm
A soap like this would keep me in the bath forever!
November 23rd, 2007 at 8:46 pm
Mmmmm…
I have a soap in my bathroom right now that is *pretending* to be your soap.
But it is An Imposter.
Darn it.
When are they going to fix the smell-a-vision on this darn internets thingie?
November 26th, 2007 at 8:12 am
Dear Maria
You would not believe it: My little clementine tree has produced fruits that can be eaten and that are ripe and good. So far, we have eaten about 5 or so. I guess, we are talking “climate change” here…..
Dear Gaia
hehehe..until your skin looks an autumn apple, stored over the central heating, in May.
Dear Sweetlife
If you try really , really, really hard, sticking your nose really close to the screen, you might get a whiff….
Fragrant greetings to you!