Sunday, August 26, 2012

Saponification Sunday...Lava Lamp Liason



1965. Chicago. I was six and a family of boys who were supposed to be babysitting me and their little brother, my then best buddy, were spending a little time "recreating" to the mellow tunes of Iron Butterfly.

It was my first memory of a Lava Lamp, a slowly boiling, rolling, rumbling mass of color on color within an oil base encased in a tall cylinder of glass. All the grooviest leather headband folk had one.




I flash backed to that particular brand of art when I created this soap last week. It was supposed to be a "spoon swirl" soap . I had it all planned out mixing up several different colors of soap tinted with Indigo, Turmeric, Wheat Grass, and Titanium Dioxide plus a little Red Moroccan Clay but then forgot what my plan was and just dumped a bunch of white soap on the bottom of the mold before I recalled the plan to "spoon" in the layers.




But as the dementia faded (about the same time the soap starting getting really thick) I realized I needed to work fast  and pretty soon I was splashing soap around like Farrah Fawcett did that time she flung paint all over a huge canvas and then rolled naked on it. I had soap everywhere, while Farrah had paint in regions even Ryan didn't know existed.

Which is why I should never teach a soap making class.

24 hours later I unmolded the log of soap (while still scraping soap off cupboards and kitchen floor) and decided it was sort of dull. The colors had faded (one of the downfalls of using natural colorants) but when I flipped one of the bars over I noticed a close resemblance to the aforementioned Lava Lamp.




Made with Babassu, Rice Bran, Castor, Olive and Sweet Almond oils along with a hefty pinch of Tussah Silk I have high hopes for this bar. Next time I make this batch I'll have to substitute some hemp oil for the olive oil, just for old times sake.




And now a questions for you antique buffs out there. I bought this very heavy soap dish, meant to be embedded into a wall, last week at a local Antique Store. The store owner thought it may have come from an old school. The lovely beast weighs nearly 6 pounds and is made of iron and covered with many layers of  white enamel paint, lead paint I'll bet. Any ideas on value, age, origin? Many thanks in advance. Now hit the showers.


6 comments:

  1. I can't help with the soap dish at all, but love the soap!

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  2. The soap looks great, Donna, even if you had different plans for it originally. It does remind me of a lava lamp. Hemp oil would be a great addition! (Love the Greg Brady photo, btw!)

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  3. I can't look too long at this week's soap, it makes me feel as if my eyesight is failing.

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  4. I think the soap looks great! Especially with all those lovely little layers and swirls of color.

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  5. Oh, I love the colors! So soft and subtle! But you should have thrown some patchouli in there, cause that's what a flower child would do. :-D I don't think I would have the patience to do a spoon swirl, unless it was a really really big spoon.

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