2010 International Festival of Glass Soap

Who would have thought that glass making would be the inspiration for a soap?!

The 2010 International Festival of Glass weekend is fast approaching (August Bank Holiday 27th - 30th August), and will be celebrated across the Stourbridge Glass Quarter, so we knew that we had to create a new soap. In 2008, we launched our very popular Festival soap. This has since been re-named as Kaleidoscope and still features it's 4 colour swirled pattern. This year's special edition soap is called Crystal.

Crystal has been inspired by the 'frit' (chunks of glass) that's melted in the pot in the furnace. Once the molten glass reaches the correct temperature its gathered onto the blowpipe, and then the glassblower gets to work creating their beautiful masterpieces.

Crystal is a sweet smelling (Geranium and Lavender) chunky topped soap, that's mainly cream coloured with pink and purple chunks running through each bar. Each bar is quite unique, and as the outer part of the bar is washed off it will reveal different patterns. Crystal is one of our lovely new Natroma coconut milk, palm-free soaps so is suitable for all skin types, and vegan customers.

The International Festival of Glass will take place between 23 August - 11 September at venues across Stourbridge's Glass Quarter including: Ruskin Glass Centre, Broadfield House Glass Museum, Red House Glass Cone, Bonded Warehouse, Holy Trinity Church and the Dial Glassworks. So we hope that you enjoy the Festival and pop in to see us at the Red House Glass Cone over the Bank Holiday weekend!

The 2010 ducklings have arrived!

We just wanted to mention some new arrivals were spotted this afternoon - the ducklings have finally arrived!

We've been expecting them for a while, so it looks like Spring is definitely here. Visitors to the Red House Glass Cone should visit the canal side, and look out for 13 little ones this year. They are quite noisy and have lovely yellow colouring at the moment. We'll try to post some pictures, if they will keep still for a few moments!

Last chance to purchase Natural Soapworks Christmas skincare gift hampers!

We're relieved to be able to say that the last of our Christmas gift hamper items have now been manufactured! It's been a very busy few weeks for everyone at The Natural Soapworks, so once again a big thank you to all of our customers who popped in to collect their orders and wish us a Merry Christmas!!

But it's not over yet! There's still one more weekend before Christmas, and we know how frustrating it can be when you can't find a suitable gift for someone.

That's why we're going to open up Studio 12 again during this last weekend of the year, and we'll have a range of Natroma skincare products, goat's milk soap mini soaps, botanical bath melts and other lovely fragrant goodies available to purchase. We still have a few of our special £5 Secret Santa hampers too, but they'll be selling out soon!

On Saturday and Sunday we'll be offering our popular 'while you wait' hamper wrapping service, so remember to pop in and see us if you're in need of some final gift inspiration!

Our final opening hours for 2009 will be:

Thursday (17th) from 1pm-4pm

Friday (18th) from 11am - 4pm

Saturday (19th) from 11am-4pm

Sunday (20th) from 11am - 4pm

Monday (21st) 10am-1pm

Tuesday (22nd) 11am - 4pm

Natural Soapworks Christmas Gifts!

This weekend, the Red House Glass Cone hosts it's popular Christmas Craft Market. There will be an abundance of craft stalls including items handmade by the Cone's resident businesses: jewellery, textiles, painted ceramics, glass designs, and of course The Natural Soapworks bathing and skincare goodies!

This year looks like being an extra special event, with mulled wine and roasted chestnuts on offer. We'll be offering some a fantastic skin care hamper offers, free gifts if you spend a certain amount, festive soaps and bath bombs, Christmas candles, handmade fragrant Christmas decorations and much, much more! The Christmas Craft Market is open on Saturday the 21st of November from 11.00 am till 4.00 pm & on Sunday the 22nd of November from 11.00 am till 4.00 pm.

Natural Soapworks Anniversary Event 3rd - 4th October 2009

Our anniversary event has arrived! To celebrate 3 years of making natural skincare, we'll be offering 10% off every item purchased in the studio at The Red House Glass Cone this weekend. In addition to this, we'll also be giving away a free bath bomb with every puchase of Q10 (full size) products. There's also a prize draw and we'll be demonstrating some lovely new products which we're launching this weekend. These include a new Q10 facial balm (a natural, intense moisturiser), some dry facial masks (supplied in powder form so you can mix them at home, and we do not need to add any preservatives), and a new Exotic Flowers body lotion enriched with camelina oil. We'll have testers available so you can try them out during your visit.

We'll be opening Studio 7 & 12 between 11am and 4pm on Saturday and Sunday, and hope you can join us to see the launch of our Christmas Gift Catalogue! We have some lovely gift ideas this year with stocking fillers from £1, and a range of natural skincare gift hampers ranging from £3 upwards. In total we have 64 different items in the studio catalogue, so there should be something for everyone. The new hampers will be on display in Studio 12 for the next few weeks, so you can see them before placing your order. Since it's our anniversary, we'll also be offering a special 10% off the first 50 Christmas orders placed in the studio during October, so you're advised to order early this year!

So that website customers don't feel left out, we'll also be offering a 10% discount off purchases made on the Natroma website at http://www.natroma.co.uk/ this weekend.

To take advantage of this 10% discount, please enter: CELEBRATE at the checkout. This code will only work on Saturday and Sunday (3rd-4th October). This offer is not applicable retroactively, and may not be used in conjunction with any other discounts. To qualify for this special discount all website orders must be paid by Sunday 5th October at 11:59pm BST.

Natural Soapworks & Natroma Anniversary event!

How time has flown by! Can you believe it, The Natural Soapworks is nearly 3 years old, and Natroma is also approaching it's first birthday too.

It's been a fantastic few years, and we've loved formulating more and more bathing and skin care products. Whoever would have thought that a soap making hobby would turn into a product range which now numbers over 100 items! But probably the nicest part of what we do, is that we get to meet lots of people to talk about skincare (and our products of course!) The feedback has been wonderful, and we're really chuffed whenever someone pops in to say "thank you" or tell us about why a particular soap or a cream is really suiting their skin. Thank you -it always makes our day!

So to celebrate our two anniversaries, we're holding a "First and Third Anniversary" event at The Red House Glass Cone on Saturday 3rd and Sunday 4th October 2009. We'll have lots of special offers, will be launching some new products, running a prize draw, and revealling our Christmas gift range! So why not call in to collect your copy of the Christmas Catalogue. You'll also be able to have a look at the new seasonal hampers which will be on display, so you can start to think about which Christmas goodies to send to your friends and loved ones.

For website customers, we don't want you to feel left out. Orders placed on The Natural Soapworks and Natroma websites on the 3rd and 4th of October will also have some special offers...we'll tell you more, closer to the time.

So for now, pencil these dates into your dairies!!

Handmade @ The Cone Exhibition

Here's the reason, why there weren't many posts during July! We've been preparing for an exhibition at the Red House Glass Cone in Stourbridge (it runs from this weekend until 13th September 2009). In a moment of sheer madness, we decided to create a soap sculpture....so here it is!

It's made from our cold-processed handmade goat's milk soap, and contains over 1000 hand carved bricks which form the shape of the Cone. As you can imagine this was really difficult to do, to ensure that each layer decreased at the correct angle to make up the outline of the Cone's shape.

Then on the outside of the Cone, we've added a collection of hundreds of ivy leaves and flowers - all moulded by hand from coloured soap. We estimate that it's taken well over 100 hours to create this sculpture, and we will be taking great care to ensure that it doesn't get wet!!

So if you're interested in wacky pieces of art, we hope you'll pop along to see our Natural Soap Cone. It smells quite nice too!

Gok at the Red House Glass Cone

Did any eagle eyed viewers spot the location for this week's Gok's Fashion fix?

Yes it was none other than the Red House Glass Cone in Stourbridge! We were all treated to some TV excitement in March when Gok and his crew came to see Mandy Moore from Wordsley, and our famous local landmark was used as the back drop for filming.

You will have seen the washing line set up by the canal, and Gok and Mandy arrived on a barge for the filming. It was a pretty poor day weatherwise, but luckily the showers held off for long enough to film Mandy's reaction as she arrived, and Gok advising her on her fashion choices. Gok was really lovely and supportive all day, helping Mandy to get over the shock of seeing all of her clothes on display for all to see.

Well done Mandy, you looked fabulous at the end of the programme so hopefully you'll pop in to see us all and show off your new wardrobe!

For anyone that missed Tuesday's show, you'll have to check out the repeat programmes of Gok's Fashion Fix on Channel 4 or watch the episode on-line.

Meet the new neighbours!

We thought you might like to see our new neighbours -aren't they cute!

These lovely little ducklings arrived 2 weeks ago and we've had some trouble taking their picture, since they move around so fast. Finally at last we managed to catch them all in one place, so hopefully you can see that there are 10 little ones following their Mum.

They are growing at an amazing speed and have doubled in size since they arrived. So if you pop down to the Red House Glass Cone, try to find the time to stop by the canal. They can be regularly seen outside our studio, and you'll know they're around since they make a surprising amount of noise for such little ones! We'll try to keep you updated on their progress.