About Our Soap

Olive Oil is one of the most luxurious oils used in homemade soap making. It is also one of the most expensive, having increased in price nearly 30% due to a disappointing olive crop harvest in 2003.

 Why All Natural Handcrafted Soap?

 Why you may ask, why should I buy handmade soap when I can get more soap for less money at the grocery store?

Generally, the commercial soaps carried at most chain stores, etc. are full of chemical additives, additives that not only dry out your skin but can lead to rashes and other irritations.This is not only because of the synthetic additives in the soap but also because most soap companies take the glycerin out of their soap. The commercial soap bars that line most grocery stores’ shelves are actually synthetic detergents. While that's great for your dishes, it's not very good for your skin.

Handmade Soap is soap in its true, pure form. It gently cleanses away excess oils and bacteria, but doesn't strip your skin of its natural oils.

 How To Tell Fake Soap from Real Soap

Fake soap is defined as all those mostly synthetic, so called "soaps" that are full of harsh detergents and petro chemicals...the ones that fill the shelves of many stores today. This includes the pretty clear (or opaque) "glycerin" soaps (many of them are made with cheap, harsh synthetic soap bases), most of the commercial shower gels and liquid soaps on the market, the highly touted "hypoallergenic" soaps recommended by main stream dermatologists (the word is meaningless!), virtually all of those rock hard triple milled ooh-la-la overpriced French soaps, and even many of the supposedly "natural" soaps found at your local health food store! Check out the ingredients (if they bother to give you any) and you'll see just how many cheap oils & fats (like soy, canola, animal fat or tallow) and synthetic petro-chemicals their so called "soaps" really contain. Don't buy into it!

You can't add a pinch of herbs and a natural sounding name and make fake synthetic soap real. Read labels carefully, ask questions, inform yourself. Even if you've been using these harsh commercial soaps for years, after you read this page and try our natural soaps, you'll know just how much better and safer your bathing experience can be!

Armed with a little bit of knowledge, real handcrafted natural soap is fairly easy to spot. It should say "soap" on the label. By law, fake soaps can't use that term so they call it a "beauty bar" or a "moisturizing bar" or some other nonsense. Look for soaps with olive oil as a main ingredient which is rich in antioxidants and revitalizing skin nutrients. Most commercial soaps contain very little or none because it's expensive, and those who do often use pomace olive, an inferior grade of oil extracted with harmful chemical solvents. Is your skin worth the very best? We think so!

Our Glycerin Soap Base

Our glycerin soap base is made from natural and food grade sources and does NOT contain any harmful detergents. Then we add our own ingredients such as vitamin E, milk, goat mild, honey, clay, etc. to make it more nurturing for your skin.

Our Clear base has an amber tint to it so you know that no chemicals have been added to clear it up.

 Scent as an Ingredient

 And lastly, let's talk briefly about scent. There are two ways to scent soap - one way is completely natural and the other is not. The 100% Natural process that extracts scent from the flower, leaf or stem of a plant results in an Essential Oil. Some scents cannot be collected naturally or may be too expensive to extract for soap making purposes. In that case, a Fragrance Oil is created in a Perfumer's Laboratory to simulate a scent - and that means it is an artificial scent, not a natural scent. Any fragrances we use are FDA approved and high quality duplications that will be appreciated by both your skin and your nose. Many customers with skin sensitivities will be looking for either Unscented Soap or soap made with natural Essential Oils, although, if you have skin sensitivities essential oils may irritate or leave rashes on the skin. It is always recommended that a skin test be done if using essential oils of any kind.

If we scent soap with a 100% Natural Essential Oil or Body Safe Fragrance Oil, we specify that clearly in the soap's description and on the label. And if a soap is Unscented, we state that fact as well. Unscented soaps may still have a slight odor that reflects their ingredients, such as goat milk or cocoa butter.

 Care & Feeding of Natural Homemade Soap

Since our homemade soap is in its pure and natural state, it doesn't contain any synthetic preservatives or artificial hardeners. It doesn't need to. With just a little care and feeding, you can prolong the life of your soap and it will serve you very well.

 

• Don't let your soap drown in water.

•  Feed your soap plenty of fresh air between uses.

•  Store your soap on a well drained soap dish.

•  Use your fresh new soap within 6 months of purchase.

•  Store unused soap in a dark cool place like a lingerie drawer or linen closet.

 

Learn More About Our Natural & Organic Ingredients

 Aloe Vera - Aloe barbadensis - native Texas succulent, often called "The Miracle Plant", soothing, emollient, antibacterial, heals skin irritations, burns, and wounds, promotes new skin growth, moisturizes, protects, and counters the effects of aging; restores skin damaged by the sun's UVB rays; we use certified organic aloe

Beeswax - Cera alba - unbleached and pure, cosmetic grade, used to give a waxy feel to cosmetics, also possesses healing qualities, only our balms contain beeswax, our soaps do not

Calcium Bentonite Clay - adsorbs and absorbs dirt, oil, and toxins from the surface of the skin, cleanses, tightens, and tones, lends a slippery feel to soaps and increases lather, great for purifying the skin, helpful in treating acne, eczema, itching, hives

Castor Oil - Ricinus communis - soothing, lubricating, rich in fatty acids, acts as a humectant to draw moisture to the skin and hair, gives a rich creamy lather to soaps

Cinnamon - Cinnamomum zeylanicum - Has a stimulating, uplifting, warming, effect and is antiseptic and astringent.

Clay (Kaolin, Moroccan Red, French Green, Rose) - cleanses and tones, absorbs dirt, oil, and toxins from the skin, increases lather, and lends natural color to our soaps

Cocoa Butter - Theobroma cacao - the fat of the cocoa bean, smells like chocolate, super emollient, for chapped skin and lips, dry skin, mature skin, stretch marks, skin irritations, and wrinkles

Coconut Oil - Cocus nucifera - emollient and healing, used in soaps to produce a big fluffy lather

Cucumber - Cucumis sativus - cooling, soothing, and healing, useful for irritated skin, freckles, windburn, sunburn, wrinkles, and skin eruptions

Earth Pigments (ultramarine's & iron oxides) - We use only naturally derived cosmetic grade earth pigments which have been used safely for many years. These pigments are made from naturally occurring compounds like iron, sulfur, china clay (kaolin), and sodium carbonate. We never use harmful synthetic FD&C dyes or CI colors. We also use Mica colorants, which are natural except for the color, for design purposes on top of the soap. The company we work with removes all toxins from the mica. We have tried food color gel for our lavender and dragon’s blood soaps but decided to use the natural approach once these soaps are gone. Almost all artificial FD&C and CI colors approved for use by the FDA are made from coal tar oil, or are synthetically produced from petroleum products.

Essential Oils - fragrant natural botanical extracts that possess many healing properties on both the physical and emotional levels, used in the ancient art and science of aromatherapy

Green Tea - contains polyphenols which are powerful antioxidants that help protect skin against the adverse effects of UV radiation sun damage and possibly photochemical damage that can lead to skin cancer; fights bacteria, reduces inflammation, decreases hormone activity, and treats acne

Honey, Raw Filtered - provides emollience, healing, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and antioxidant properties, as well as vital nutrients for the skin

Jojoba Oil - Simmondsia chinensis - our organic golden jojoba oil is unrefined thereby retaining all of its healing properties, a natural mimic of the oil secreted by human skin used to protect against premature aging and wrinkling and to lubricate skin and hair, a pure liquid ester that will never go rancid, non-comedogenic (will not clog pores), a powerful antioxidant, antibacterial, a soothing and conditioning agent, and useful for the treatment of acne, great for sensitive skin

Oatmeal flour - Avena sativa - soothing, moisturizing, demulcent, softening, calming, good for rashes, itching, bites, and all skin irritations, oatmeal also serves as a gentle exfoliant and cleanser.

Olive Oil - Olea europaea - used extensively in skincare for centuries, high in monounsaturated fatty acids and vitamin E, a powerful antioxidant and a superior moisturizer, used to nourish and protect the skin and to combat the effects of aging, draws moisture to the skin while allowing normal skin functions to take place, one of the very best oils for natural skin care; we use only cold pressed olive oils (never the cheaper solvent extracted pomace oil): recent research has shown that olive oil possesses oleocanthal - a powerful anti-inflammatory, anti-aging compound and pain killer.

Pink Himalayan Sea Salt - posesses the ability to re-mineralize the body with minerals and trace elements essential to soften skin as well as ease aches and pains

 Sea Salt - sodium chloride - contains 84 elements and minerals found naturally in the human body which are essential to good health, used as a treatment for psoriasis, eczema, acne, and general good health, relieves muscle tension, soothes and softens the skin; we use natural solar dried salt from pristine waters

Shea Butter, Ghana (organic, unrefined) - Butyrospermum parkii - Extracted from the kernels of a wild African tree, shea butter is an excellent emollient with great healing properties.  High in triglycerides and fatty acids, its soft buttery texture melts easily into the skin.  Traditionally used by indigenous people for burns, wounds, sunburn, muscle aches and as a moisturizing beauty aid for hair and skin. This product is made in Ghana. It is made and sold by local tribes to help sustain their village.

Sodium Hydroxide - Commonly known as lye, this is what transforms our premium vegetable oils into pure natural soap. All bar soap is made with it. If you make the soap properly though, there is no active lye left in the final bar.  Please don't compare our lye soap with grandma's old fashioned lye soap. Our exact scientific formulations and improved ingredients insure a milder product that's much gentler to your skin than the soaps of yesteryear.

Vitamin E - tocopherols - a natural anti-oxidant that helps to slow the aging process by scavenging free radicals, heals, moisturizes, and protects, prevents scarring, and reduces UV exposure; we use only natural vitamin E, never synthetic

The information presented here is for educational purposes only and is not meant to diagnose or treat any physical or emotional condition.  While allergic reactions to our pure and natural ingredients are uncommon, we recommend you test our products first on a small patch of skin for 24 hours.  In the unlikely event that redness or irritation develops, discontinue use.

We make our soap completely from scratch, using raw ingredients and recipes we've created. The ingredients we use to make our handmade soaps vary, depending on the type of soap made. All soaps are made with some kind of fat or oil, some kind of liquid, and of course 'lye'. Most of us have heard our whole lives that oil and water don't mix. And they don't - Unless you change their chemical composition. And lye (sodium hydroxide) does exactly that. It changes the oil and water so that they can blend and become soap. Please make a mental note that although lye is one of the ingredients used to create soap, there is no lye left in our wonderful soaps after the cook stage of soap making! Lye is transformed in the soap making process. All of Granny Kate’s handmade soaps start out with cold pressed Olive Oil for the best, nutrient rich soap we can make.

Each individual soap listed on our website will include the ingredients used to make that soap along with a general description of the soap. The ingredients will also be repeated word for word on the wrapper.