[print-me do_not_print=”.emoji”]
Why Handmade Soap
is better for you than commercial soaps
Especially Handmade soap by “Kauai Girl Soap”
Most of our handmade soaps are made using the cold process form of saponification* where pure, high quality edible vegetable oils are turned into surfactants (soap) and glycerol (glycerin) using sodium hydroxide (lye). Because all of our soap is “handmade, hand-cut” each bar is unique and no two bars are or ever will be identical**. When you buy a bar of soap from Kauai Girl Soap (or are a lucky giftee) no one will ever have an identical bar like yours.
We also make a limited and small amount of French Milled Luxury soap.
(see post: What is French Milled or Triple Milled Soap?)
The way humans have made soap for hundreds of years
There are three processes of soap making. The old world, original process of making soap which is called Cold process. There are also modern take offs of this process called glycerin (clear-opaque bars sometimes referred to as “Melt & Pour”) and liquid or foaming liquid. Cold process, glycerin and liquid soap making is done by using the process of saponification. Saponification is a strict proportional solution of water and sodium hydroxide [lye] (used for cold process and glycerin soaps) or potassium hydroxide (used for liquid soaps) mixed with more strict portions of natural oils and/or in olden days…animal fats. The sodium hydroxide & water mixture becomes a base catalyst to the oils. It is basically a fuel that by chemical reaction at the molecular level turns the oils into “soap molecules” and “glycerol” and when complete, 100% of the lye is used up, Gone! The finished product is soap molecules (surfactants) and glycerol (glycerin), and no lye. Soaps must have a curing time of six to eight weeks for the chemical reactions to finish. Cold process soaps have the colors and scents added during the mixing period. Once the cold process soap is cured it is beautiful, scented and ready to use. Once the glycerin (clear) and liquid soaps are cured, they are considered a “base”. The glycerin soap base is then ready to be melted down into a liquid and have the magic of colors and scents added. It is then poured into molds for cooling. Since it has already gone through its 6-8 week curing process, it is ready to use once it has cooled back to room temperature. Glycerin based soaps are very high in glycerol (a humectant) and it therefore attracts (PULLS) moisture from the air. It is silky soft and smooth. It is a much softer bar of soap versus cold process and does not last quite as long. All of our finished Glycerin opaque soaps are shrink wrapped to keep them from absorbing moisture from the surrounding air. Their melting point is also much lower than cold process soap and they will melt into liquid blobs if left in hot environments over 110 degrees like a mailbox or car in hot climates.
Our base Kauai Girl cold process Soap is made in the Castile method where we only use pure vegetable oils (mainly pure olive oil with other precious vegetable and nut oils) and no animal fats.
(Also see A brief history of soap making)
Why such a big deal about Glycerin?
Glycerin is a humectant which is basically a molecule that retains and holds in moisture and leaves it behind, in this case on your skin. So our basic handmade soap with its natural glycerol humectant is very beneficial to your skin. The glycerin in our soap also makes our bars a little softer and silky smooth over commercial soap…. PLUS, our more complex Hawaiian-Couture and Natural soaps have more humectants, oils, herbs and conditioners as well…. PLUS, we also superfat our soap (see superfatting below).
Why doesn’t the soap I buy in the store have this much glycerin?
Commercial soap manufacturers make sure all of the oil molecules in their soap turn to surfactants and glycerin. Then they remove the glycerin from their soap to make their soap bars harder so that they last longer and the chemical process to remove the glycerol is just more chemicals and that also makes their soap very drying and harsh.
They sell the glycerin as an additional product to gain more profit.
Our Kauai Girl handmade handcrafted soaps are natural and retain all of the glycerol, and contain absolutely no additional un-natural chemicals that are harmful to your skin.
More benefits when using Kauai Girl Handmade Soaps
Superfatting
Even MORE benefits to Kauai Girl Handmade Soaps.
This is like adding nourishing LOTION to the soap.
Supperfatting is a term used in percentages to indicate an amount of unconverted oil in the finished bar of soap. The recipe is adjusted so that there is a percentage (usually 1 to 10%) of oil that will not be converted to surfactants and glycerol. This leaves a small percentage of skin conditioning oils in the soap. The practice of superfatting is NOT practiced by commercial soap manufacturers. All Kauai Girl soaps are made with a superfatting of 5-8%. We do this by holding out the given percentage of the best skin conditioning oils (olive, canola, sunflower, soybean, cocoa butter, Shea butter, sweet almond, hemp & jojoba) and slowly add them into the mixture after the sodium hydroxide mixture has been mixed at high speed with the main oil ingredients. This means that once we have mixed the lye and oils together at a molecular level the lye solution is dispersed through the existing oil molecules and is already binding to them. The last and best oils are then slowly mixed in by hand to disperse throughout the mixture the Superfatting percentage of, will not be converted into surfactants and glycerol but be available to nourish and condition your skin even more. The percentage may seem low but it is as much as can be left without making the soap oily. Superfatting is just another reason why our bars of soap are so silky smooth to the touch when you unwrap them and nourishing to your skin when you use them.
Natural Safe Colors
Our Hawaiian-Couture and Specialty soap colors are made with, or by mixing natural micas, and/or edible food grade colors, and/or natural mother earth clays, and/or botanical powders into our products. Micas are natural colored minerals from mother earth and because they are natural, light, soft and flexible, they are ground into fine cosmetic powders and used for coloring cosmetics. The liquid coloring’s that we use are all food and lab grade colorants.
Natural Safe Scents
Our unique scents come from combinations of pure and natural essential oils, fragrance oils and other natural ingredients like herbs and botanicals, which are also additionally beneficial to your skin.
Our NATURAL line of soaps
Our “Natural” line of handcrafted soaps are made with colors that come straight from the earth. Natural clay’s, minerals and botanical powders (made from dried plants/roots/seeds) and the scents all come from nature too which makes our Natural Soaps totally natural and “no chemical” easy on the environment as you rinse them down the drain.
Safe for You and Safe for Mother Earth
Because our soaps’ chemicals, colors and scents are all natural or food based they are not harmful to your skin or mother earth. Most of our ingredients are very beneficial to your skin, hair, nose and body and they rinse down the drain without negative impact on mother earth.
100% Handmade
Our soaps are 100% handmade using traditional and proprietary recipes with lots of love and care. Each batch is meticulously measured, mixed, colored and scented, cut and wrapped by hand. We have modified our recipes to allow the addition of more beneficial skin ingredients such as natural humectants, essential oils, clay’s, botanicals and minerals.
Beauty
We believe that you deserve to pamper yourself as often as possible, so why not make your daily bath or shower a wonderful pampering event. With this goal, we took our original centuries old soap recipes that have been handed down from generation to generation and carefully/scientifically modified them and tested them personally and also with the help of family and friends until we got hugs (not just thumbs up) from everyone. Modifying the recipes also allows us to superfat our soaps and make them even more luxurious to your body and senses. These recipe changes also allowed us to make them as beautiful as the Hawaiian Sunset I grew up with and ALL FOR YOUR PLEASURE.
Our Promise
If you’re not 100% happy with any of our products we will replace them or give you your money back.
Affordable, Good For You, Good For Mother Earth
Our handmade personal care products are an affordable little luxury that are naturally wonderful for your skin, dreamy to your nose and as you rinse them off, easy on Mother Earth.
*The process of saponification is a chemical reaction between fats and/or oils with an alkali agent (sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide). During the process the fats, oils and alkali are all chemically changed into soap and glycerol (glycerin) leaving no trace of the alkali. Depending on the recipe a residual amount of oil may be left over as an additional skin conditioner (this is known as superfatting). The saponification or curing process takes 4 to 8 weeks depending on temperature, humidity and the ingredients used.
Sodium hydroxide, also called caustic soda or lye and is used to make cold process soaps which result in a hard bar of soap. It is extreme toxic in its natural form. It has a violent exothermic reaction when mixed with water (it gives off extreme scalding heat and toxic fumes). It is an extremely caustic metallic base and alkaline corrosive. It is hygroscopic (will absorb moisture from air). When used in soap making, it is a base (or think of it as a fuel) that is completely consumed through the process of saponification and is not found in the finished product.
Potassium hydroxide, also called caustic potash is very corrosive by nature and is hygroscopic (will absorb moisture from air). It is mainly used to make soft and liquid soaps and is not found in the finished product.
**Uniqueness applies to handmade and hand cut soaps. Molded soaps will always be identical in shape but may be unique in internal soap design.