So there we go: I have been working for a while on a gardenia scent soap, for my “perfume in a soap” series of fragrant soaps that I do not sell normally, but offer as treat for friends and fans. Like … in draws. The picture shows you the result sitting in the factory on the shelf, taken yesterday. 100 gr. of plush gardenia.

I haven’t totally decided what to do with it, or how to use it. It goes together with a piece of paper that ‘s going to sit on the blue “think about wall” in the factory, saying: “USING OFFERS ON FACEBOOK”. In the end, I can do draws, or add it complementary to full bottle purchases or offer it as treat for anything else: that’s a marketing decision, basically. And boring for you , probably.

So let’s talk about plush gardenia, the perfume in a soap. When pouring the glycerine soap yesterday, it was like “WOW!”.. .total gardenia overdose. I made a prototype a couple of months ago. You know: I needed to test the scent and it’s performance in soap. Does it bloom? Does it last? How’s the jasmine concrète doing with some other ingredients (natural extract of J. grandiflorum, produced basically to isolate the absolute. Due to the high wax percentage in concrètes, they are perfect for soaps. I got mine from Egypt) ?

Basically, I composed a scent for the soap, making sure to only use ingredients that survive the alkaline environment. I mixed it and poured 100 gr of a prototype soap, round and still sitting in the house. (Actually, I did so a couple of times as not every scent trial was performing as expected) Then, I let the soap sit for a month and started using it. It is an intense perfume experience. Think: Super luxurious. Quite amazing, actually. The fragrance contains 12 ingredients, one being the above mentioned jasmine concrète. There are two molecules that make up a small part of the gardenia HEADSPACE in the soap perfume, too. These are hexenyl tiglate and methyl benzoate. A very small percentage of the overall mixture consists of these, but they are super important. Other key ingredients: Salicylates (thing: Powdery), lactones (think white flower creaminess), and some other ingredients that provide lift, and add floral volume.

For a soap: Quite a complex fragrance. While packing the soap, I wonder how this fragrance would actually do in ethanol. When making the next batch, I have to try this, too. Although, with Sotto la luna Gardenia, I have enough gardenia for the moment. I packed 49 of these. Ok, … I ruined some packaging envelopes. 1 is not packed. It will sit in our bathroom.