Making Soap 201

Once you've mastered the basics of making cold-process soap, we will explore different techniques of soapmaking, gifting and selling soap, packaging and labelling requirements, and suppliers.

In this lesson, you'll be learning the following:

• Making a hot process soap
  
• Making a cold process soap with hanger swirl
• Gifting/selling soap requirements
• Packaging/labelling
• Suppliers

You'll leave with 2 loaves of soap that you will need to unmold and cut at home in 36-48 hours. Soap will need to cure for 30 days, spaced apart from each other to allow air to circulate between the bars.

This workshop is for people who have already made soap for personal use, soap-making experience is required. If your have no experience, you'll first want to take the Making Soap 201 workshop. We currently only make vegetarian soap in our shop but these skills are easily transferred to the use of tallow and lard. Please let us know if you are planning to use tallow or lard so we can provide you with a good starting recipe.

PREPARATIONS*

Clothing: What you wear is important! Please bring these items, or we can provide you with gloves, apron, and eye protection. Wear a shirt or coveralls, something you'd wear when painting. Hair should be pulled back.

Equipment: You can take your soap home the same day in our bamboo and silicone loaf mold. The mold will need to be returned to us. Alternately, please bring your own wood, glass or silicone loaf pan (please no metal), or even a clean Pringles can or 1 Litre milk carton. Hanger swirls work best in a traditional loaf mold.

Date: Our soapmaking workshops are done on select Saturdays at the Saint John City Market. We will touch base with you once you purchase the lesson, to coordinate the details based on mutual availability.

Ingredients: Soapmaking is particular, and using fragrance oils and essential oils from other retail suppliers is not recommended. We cannot guarantee the quality of your soap if you use ingredients that we haven't sourced and tested. 

ALLERGY ALERT

We use olive, avocado, coconut and shea butter in our basic recipe. If you are allergic to any of these ingredients, we will adjust the recipe accordingly. Unfortunately there is the potential for cross-contamination in our workshop due to the daily use of these oils, which may not be suitable for people with severe allergies. If you have a severe allergy to these ingredients, please send us a message on the chat function.