I can't seem to get the 'reply with quote' facility to work properly, any advice welcome.
Re: colours, I'm glad to see that I'm not alone in believing that if it requires synthetics, it's not worth it. Most of my soaps are cream coloured if left to their own devices. Snow white soaps need Titanium Dioxide added - why bother? I can get a nice orangy yellow just by using unrefined palm oil, green by using an extract of chlorophyll, and brick red by adding red clay. Bentonite clay (of razor slip fame) gives a very pale green if other factors such as the oils used or other additives don't overpower it.
Does anyone like vanilla - I have a bottle of olive oil heavily infused with vanilla which I'm itching to experiment with - until I test it out I don't even know if the scent will carry over into the soap - but can reasonably confidently predict that the soap will be brown. Any suggestions for what other scents would appeal in combination with vanilla will be given serious consideration.
Any thoughts on cinnamon; dried cinnamon gives a good noticable scent, very warm, but will mean a brown speckled soap.
Sweeny Todd - glad to see you! I'll be very interested to see what you make of your sample, especially in terms of cushioning, as this is something that is difficult for me to personally test as you can imagine. You'll be pleased to know that all my shaving soaps have 12& Shea butter - the reason it is so good in soap is that it has a high level of 'unsaponifiables' in it, meaning parts of the oil that are not turned into soap, and so remain as free oil in the soap. My eucalyptus is very faintly scented. I've been toying with a Tea Tree soap. A lot of people like it's medicinal smell - although probably not the rose lovers, methinks.