Natroma Handmade Goat's Milk Soap Wins Best Buy Award!

Natroma - handmade aromatherapy organic goat's milk soap 

We’re delighted to announce that The Green Parent magazine has awarded a Best Buy award to our Natroma Carrot & Calendula organic goat’s milk soap in their 2016 Natural Beauty Awards!

Handmade with organic cruelty-free certified botanical oils and aromatherapy grade essential oils, our Carrot & Calendula has been a popular soap variety for a while.  So we were thrilled to hear that one of our handmade natural soaps beat off competition from much larger companies, to achieve the Best Buy award!

Our goat's milk soaps were developed especially for eczema, psoriasis and sensitive skin types, so we hope this award encourages more people to try using natural soaps as a more gentle and natural way of cleansing their skin.  We think the addition of the goat's milk really adds something to the way our aromatherapy soaps feel on the skin, helping sufferers of eczema and psoriasis who often struggle to find cosmetic products that don't cause skin irritation. 

Each year The Green Parent Magazine Beauty Awards search for the safest, cleanest, greenest and most effective natural products in a range of categories.  Each of the winning items in the 2016 awards has been carefully chosen and tested by an independent review panel.  The Award winners will appear in the 2016 Natural Beauty Bible which will be published later in July.

We decided to enter this year’s awards because of The Green Parent’s approach, they say:  “We insist on products free from petroleum-based chemicals, propylene glycol, parabens or sulphates and NO animal testing so you can be assured of their safety. We believe that beauty is more than skin deep. So we seek out those products that are made by passionate people; companies that we can trust; those who put care and love into their work”.

Thanks Green Parent - we're delighted with this win!

What is aromatherapy?

These days, there are all manner of products on the market claiming to have aromatherapy benefits. The problem is that quite often cosmetics have names that make them sound like aromatherapy products, but they only contain minute amounts of essential oils or even have synthetic fragrances. These products may not even be formulated by a professional Aromatherapist, so how do you spot the genuine article? We hope the following information about essential oils and aromatherapy will be useful.

Aromatherapy is often defined as the careful, controlled use of essential oils, to enhance the well-being of the mind, body and spirit. Essential oils are highly concentrated, volatile, and fragrant substances that are extracted from flowers, berries, twigs, wood, seeds, fruits and leaves of many familiar plants. Essential oils have many different properties and research has shown that each oil contains a complex mixture of chemical components which contribute to essential oil therapeutic qualities. These could be stimulant, expectorant, anti-infectious, anti-inflammatory, relaxant, calming, soothing or uplifting. The important thing to stress is that they need to be used with respect and knowledge, so aromatherapy is far more than just pretty smells!

A professional Aromatherapist will have extensive knowledge of the therapeutic qualities and the chemical components within each essential oil. This enables them to create synergistic blends that are personalized for their client, taking into account their needs and any existing health conditions. In the hands of a knowledgable professional Aromatherapist, this means that these plant essences can be therapeutically blended to assist with stress, enhance health and support the body’s own healing processes. Clinical aromatherapy focuses on achieving synergy within the essential oil blend, and usually employs massage to use essential oils in a holistic treatment. So while this is not a medical treatment, aromatherapy has been found to work psychologically and physiologically to improve well-being.

In the coming months, we’ll be featuring a number of essential oils to explain their qualities and why we use them in our handmade natural skincare products. In the meantime, you can see more about our natural ingredients on our websites.

The Natural Soapworks and Natroma product ranges are formulated in-house by a professionally qualified Clinical Aromatherapist, and member of the International Federation of Professional Aromatherapists (IFPA).

Skin Spring Clean with Natroma

Now that the days are lengthening in the UK, it's lovely to see some very welcome sunshine! Spring is on the way and we'll soon be baring more skin again, so it's a good time to review your skincare regime. During the colder months it's easy to neglect the skin, and it can become damaged by being exposed to the elements and the dry air from central heating systems.

Therefore we'd recommend using a cream cleanser and a muslin cloth each day, to gently cleanse and exfoliate away dry patches, and brighten the complexion. Our gentle facial approach, involves a 3 stage process which takes only a couple of minutes each day - it's no fuss and can be built into even the busiest of mornings and evenings.

First of all you massage our rich cream cleanser across the face, allowing it to draw out skin impurities. We formulated this to harness the deep cleansing power of organic caster oil and white clay, with the moisturising benefits of nilotica shea butter and D-panthenol, and the wonderful skin soothing properties of calendula and chamomile botanical extracts. These are gentle cleansers, fragranced only with organic hydrolats (flower waters), making them well suited to sensitive skin types, safe to use around the eyes and perfect for removing make up.

Our Natroma cleanser works best when used with a muslin cloth. You simply rinse a muslin cloth in hand-hot water and wring out so the cloth is warm and moist. Use the cloth to gently remove the cleanser cream, make-up and skin impurities - and it will lightly exfoliate the skin to leave it feeling refreshed, brighter and clean.

We'd then suggest using some hydrolat toner to ensure all traces of cleanser are gone and to further refresh the skin. Hydrolats are produced during the steam distillation of essential oils, so contain dissolved plant extracts which are kind and soothing to the skin. Ours are presented in a Miron glass, a special violet glass which protects the hydrolat from light.

The final stage of our mini facial, is to smooth on some moisturiser. Like the rest of our range, Natroma's moisturisers are handmade and contain a blend of flower waters, botanical oils (including jojoba oil), natural plant extracts (rosehip seed and arctic cranberry seed), and are lightly fragranced with Neroli and Rose essential oils. We're proud of these lovely moisturisers since they feel light on the skin and sink in quickly to provide lasting skin hydration without any greasiness.

Make up can be applied after moisturising, making this a quick but enjoyable mini pampering session at the start and end to every day!

To encourage everyone to try out the Natroma range, we have a special Spring Offer on the Natroma website. We're offering the facial starter kit (includes a 30ml cleanser and moisturiser in airless pumps with a 50ml hydrolat and a muslin cloth). This kit should last for around 4-6 weeks and normally costs £15.25, but our special Spring Offer saves you 15% and is just £12.95 These are available in 3 varieties - Chamomile (unscented), Rose and Orange blossom (Neroli). We hope you enjoy!

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 New Years Resolutions

Happy New Year to all Natural Soapworks customers!

It's been lovely to hear back from so many people, regarding their Christmas orders - it sounds like your gift recipients loved our packaging and have had an enjoyable time trying out our skincare products too. Our thanks for the lovely feedback!

It's now that time of year, when we all make some resolutions. So as a responsible skin care business, we thought we'd share some of our resolutions for 2010 with our readers.

We resolve to:

1. Continue to only make skincare products containing natural fragrances from essential oils and natural colours.

2. Continue to source only the finest ingredients for our skincare products, taking care in selecting responsible, eco-friendly suppliers who are opposed to any form of animal testing.

3. Continue to only use sustainable palm oil in our goat's milk soaps - so our soap production never contributes to the destruction of the orangutan's habitat in Borneo.

4. Introduce a new range of soaps in 2010, which will not contain any palm oil within their formulation. Watch this space!

5. Continue to publicise and support the work of Borneo Orangutan Survival UK, and their wonderful work to save and rehabiliate orphaned orangutans.

6. Continue to only use paper, glass and plastic product packaging which can be recycled. Our gift packaging will also be recyclable (or be manufactured from recycled materials).

7. Continue to re-cycle boxes and packaging materials and ensure that used printer toners etc are donated to charitable causes.

8. Maintain our stance of refusing to use cosmetic ingredients containing parabens, SLS detergents, pthalates, PEG's, petroleum derived ingredients (including mineral oil) and other nasty ingredients in our products.

9. Continue to be perfectionists - whether it be taking extra care when we manufacture our handmade skincare products, or packaging them with care so they reach our mail order customers in perfect condition. This also means that we'll value and continue to listen to customer feedback, so we keep on improving The Natural Soapworks and Natroma product ranges.

10. Continue to offer our customers great value for money by selling concentrated natural products which last and genuinely work in harmony with the skin. We'll also increase the selection of items available to mail order from The Natural Soapworks website.

We'll review these at the end of 2010 to see how we've done!

So to start things off this year, we've made a few changes to The Natural Soapworks website. Sadly part of this is due to changes in our prices, due to the increase in VAT and raw material costs etc. But this is our first price rise since 2008, and we've done everything we can to keep our products as affordable as possible. We'll also be updating the special offers page regularly so website customers can benefit from extra savings throughout 2010. So remember to visit: http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/Special.aspx

To end on a positive, we've also reviewed our website postage charges for 2010 - these used to be on a sliding scale which was dependent on the value of the order. But from today we're pleased to announce a flat rate approach for The Natural Soapworks website. Orders under £50 will now cost just £2.95 on postage, and if you spend over £50 then postage will be FREE!

Thanks for reading!

Natural foot care

In the third of our series of articles abour Autumn skincare, today we're looking at the feet.

A major problem associated with the feet at the end of Summer, is dry, cracked heels. These are typically caused by wearing open backed sandals during the summer. Cracked heel problems can vary between dry or flaky skin, to hard skin and deep fissures which may be very sore. So it’s a good idea to treat your feet to a pedicure.

We’d suggest using a natural pumice stone to smooth away areas of toughened skin. But a gentler approach would be to use a foot scrub to slough away dead skin. This is why we developed our Peppermint Foot Scrub (see http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/Saltscrubs.aspx)

These contain a mixture of fine salts (including Dead Sea Salt), nourishing botanical oils, honey, shea butter, and Vitamin E. It's fragranced with lavender, peppermint and tea tree essential oils, and leaves the feet feeling moisturised and with a delicious fragrance! After smoothing the skin, we'd suggest that a balm product is applied to assist with re-hydration of the skin.

Psst....watch this space, since we have a new foot product on the way! Our rich Foot Balm contains jojoba oil, cocoa and avocado butters, with healing lavender, chamomile and tea tree to refresh and nourish the feet. We'll be adding this to the website in the next few days.

Natroma Autumn Skincare Advice

Sadly the days are shortening, and it’s definitely becoming chilly at night! So while Autumn may encourage you to enjoy outdoor activities, it’s important to remember that your skin will retain less moisture as the air becomes cooler and drier. This is why at this time of year, many people experience dryness, fine lines, dull and sallow skin tone, sun and age spots, flaking and irritation as well as the flare-up of some conditions like rosacea. So it’s a good idea to pamper your skin in the Autumn and make some adjustments to your skincare regime in readiness for Winter. During the coming weeks, we’ll be publishing a series of articles on Autumn skincare starting with the hands and nails.

Hands and Nails

Nails and cuticles can become dry and flaky at this time of year, so we’d suggest that you invest in products which will replenish lost moisture to keep the skin soft and in good condition.

Our orange blossom and rose hand creams have a lovely formulation, enriched with jojoba and avocado oils with glycerine, comfrey and evening primrose extracts to nourish and condition the hands without greasiness. For the nails we’d particularly recommend a butter enriched nail balm. Our Nail Silk contains shea and cocoa butters, jojoba and avocado oils to replenish the nail surface and surrounding skin. This is a rich balm which smells heavenly (it contains frankincense and neroli, with a touch of lime) but it sinks in within a few minutes. Many of our customers enjoy massaging their nails and cuticles with Nail Silk, whilst watching the TV each evening.

For extra special pampering, invest in a pair of cotton gloves. Slather your hands with balm and hand cream and wear the gloves in bed. You’ll be amazed at how much softer your hands will feel in the morning!

Visit http://www.natroma.co.uk/store/d26-nails-and-hands/ for more information on these items.

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!!

What's so special about goat’s milk soap?

It’s a question we’re asked most weeks! We can guarantee that anyone who asks, has never tried a goat’s milk soap before. We’ll try to explain why we think goat’s milk soap is special…

Goat’s milk soap is more difficult to make than a typical handmade bar, since the milk affects the saponification process. We use real goat’s milk (not powdered) since it contains proteins, amino acids and Vitamin A to nourish and soften the skin. You may read some articles which claim that natural goat’s milk soap has the same pH as the skin. We’d disagree with this claim, since soap is a naturally alkaline substance, so it’s doubtful if a natural soap could become slightly acidic without the addition of chemicals.

Our formulation has come about after years of perfecting our soap recipe. The brief was to create a hard, long-lasting bar with a rich, creamy lather whilst being highly moisturizing and skin-kind too. Okay, we admit that we’re perfectionists so that’s why it’s taken a few years to create our recipe!

It’s no accident that our soap contains many botanical oils and butters (such as olive, coconut, shea and cocoa) and these had to be carefully balanced to produce the rich texture and foaming qualities we were looking for. We also use a cold-process saponification manufacturing process and use traditional handmade wooden moulds. Each new soap is matured for 4-8 weeks so it hardens and becomes mild before it is presented for sale. So the next time you try a new natural soap remember that each recipe will be different, since the skilled soap maker crafts their recipe to produce particular results.

So what can you expect from a Natural Soapworks goat’s milk soap? The first thing people always do, is give the bar a sniff! Fragranced with pure essential oils, each soap variety has its own special character, and this adds to the pleasure of using the soap each day. We also love pretty soaps, so we use natural clays and spices to add colour and we often swirl them through the soap so each bar has unique patterns. The goat’s milk gives a unique, creamy lather that’s so rich that it can be used for shaving or as a natural body wash. The soap suits delicate skin conditions, and people who visit our little shop are often invited to try washing their hands before making a purchase. Most people are impressed by the conditioning feel of the lather, and everyone comments on how soft their skin feels after just one wash. So we’d sum up our goat’s milk soaps as being pretty and fragrant, but very functional and full of top quality ingredients.

Tempted to give it a try? Visit out Goat’s Milk Soap page if you’d like more details:

http://www.naturalsoapworks.co.uk/GoatSoaps.aspx