Goats milk soap stocks are improving!

It's been a busy few weeks at The Natural Soapworks....making lots of soap!

Christmas was so busy that we actually ran out of some of our most popular varieties, but rest assured we now have lots of lovely goats milk soap bars curing on our drying racks. But before they are ready, we still have lots of soap offers which will be available in the studio and on the Special offers page of The Natural Soapworks website during January.

The website also has a new soap (it usually sells out in the studio before we have time to add it to the website!) which is called Blue Lagoon. This is a really lovely soap with a deep evocative fragrance of ylang ylang blended with vetiver and citrus notes. It has a deep purple base layer with a thicker blue layer over the top and contains Monoi de Tahiti, which makes the lather really creamy. It's one of our most luxurious goats milk soaps, so catch it while you can, by visiting the goats milk soap page on our website: Blue Lagoon goats milk soap

We should also mention that we're having lots of fun developing some new goats milk and coconut milk soap varieties. These are for a new range of contemporary soaps which are on the way - they will be launched in time for Mother's Day... so watch this space!

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!!

It's beginning smell a bit like Christmas....

It's that time of year again, when soap production is stepped up in readiness for Christmas. We've been very busy formulating so we can introduce a few new seasonal soaps for this year. But there will be some old favourites too. So don't worry Frankincense & Myrrh fans, the first batch was made yesterday and the studio smells just heavenly!

So if you pop in to see us this weekend, we hope you'll understand why there's more than a hint of Frankincense, Myrrh, Cinnamon and Clove in the air. We'll be on site all weekend, but will have limited opening hours on Saturday since we're running another soap making class to introduce another group of people to the addictive fun of soaping!

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!

Botanical Soap Making Courses

We're still taking bookings for our popular cold-process soap making courses this Summer. But we wanted to mention a special annual one which is scheduled to run at The Birmingham Botanical Gardens on Saturday 27th June 2009.

Our soap making class will run from 10.30am - 4pm in the Study Centre. This is such a beautiful venue, since you'll have the chance to walk around the gardens and glasshouses during the lunch break and after the class ends.

We always run the soap making classes at The Botanical Gardens with a larger group. This is a big advantage during the practical sessions, since participants work in pairs to share the vigorous whisking that's involved in making real soap! Since it's a bigger group, there's also a discount on our usual course fees, so you'll only pay £65.

So if you're interested in learning how to make real soap in a beautiful botanical setting then please contact the Study Centre to reserve your place on 0121 454 1860.

http://www.birminghambotanicalgardens.org.uk/leisurelearning/workshopseries?id=11