Color Change over Days...

[adoptapitbull]

Is it normal for soap dyes to change color over a few days? I used a purple in my lavender soap that looked to be an ugly tan/brown when I first mixed it with the oils. After I cut it and let it cure for a few days, the prettiest purple resulted. Is this an error in my dyes, or does this happen often with certain recipes? Do certain ingredients cause the color shift?

Since I'm just starting out, I did not buy expensive dye, rather a set of about 10 cosmetic dyes (approved for CP soap) on ebay.

 

[judymoody]

Yes, the final color can often take days or weeks to materialize. Some fragrance oils also discolor over time - those with vanillin will get progressively darker over many days.

For reliable colors, I'd stick to a reputable vendor like Brambleberry. She has a wide variety of liquid color (labcolors) and powders like micas, oxides, and ultramarines.

 

[Njones]

I have a cinnamon & spice soap that starts out a light tan & darkens to a rich chocolate brown as it cures,... some ingredients react slowly to the soapmaking process, so it can be trial and error when you are starting out.

 

[carebear]

some darken with exposure to light
some are pH dependent

some do/are neither

 

[adoptapitbull]

OK, good. Just making sure I didn't mess it up somehow. So far I've only see it happen with the purple color...I'll keep notes so I know for next time.

 

[Cashie]

Post pics! Let us see how pretty it turned out.

 

[cleanwater]

You didn't mess it up. I have experienced that as well, particularly with purples. You take it out of the mold and think "Oh, poop!" Then it turns back to the right color over a couple days. I believe that this is one of the pH dependent colors Carebear referred to.

 

[adoptapitbull]

It also seems that this purple doesn't mix well with other colors. I mixed it with another purple in my lavender soap and you can see two distinct purples...which is actually kinda nice. Now in my wine soap, the pinky red all looks the same, and then there are 3 bars that are basically all tan purple, and they are sweating. The other bars are not. It seems like wherever that color goes, there are issues. But, it did turn out OK last time so I'm not giving up yet!

All I wanted was a wine color, darnit!

 

[adoptapitbull]

Oh fudge...

The color is pinky red on the outside, and tan on the inside!

I hope it'll all become uniform once it's given time. And the funny thing is, it smells the same as the beer soap. I used a cabernet sauvignon that I boiled the alcohol and some of the water out of to give it a richer color. I didn't boil the alcohol out of the beer, but I did let it get very flat. My husband was cutting it and he was like, "This smells like poop!"...he thought I added an EO that smelled that way. I think it'll calm down since the beer soap has a very mild smell right now and it's almost a week old.

And if it's a giant failure, not a big deal....I used cheap ingredients on it since it was a test.