Just made my 1st facial soap, wish me luck

[seven]

I am cursed with oily skin which is prone to break outs. I've been seeing a dermatologist (quite an expensive one) for almost 3 years. At 1st it was ok, my skin cleared up, but lately it's been breaking out again

Lotsa whiteheads and disgusting blackheads, and the occasional pimple or 2. I washed my face twice a day and moisturize, but it didn't seem to improve the condition of my skin

I did a read on the ingredients list of my cleanser and cleansing milk (from the dermatologist) and they were full of chemicals (laureth, isopraffin?, parabens, etc). I can't pinpoint to which one i am having a bad reaction to, but have made a decision to leave them altogether for a more natural approach of cleansing my face.

I made a small 250gr batch, and my recipe is as follows:

jojoba 5%
sunflower 10%
olive 40%
apricot kernel 5%
sweet almond 15%
castor 5%
coconut 15%
beeswax 5%

a dash of kaolin and pink clay, plus a few drops of vit. E, tea tree and lavender EOs.

I was looking for a mild cleansing bar, and so i was only using a small quantity of CO (less than 10 cleansing value). From what i've read so far, oily skin is not supposed to be stripped of oils, otherwise the skin is going to work extra hard to replace the stripped oils.

I am really tired of my skin looking like what it is right now, so fingers crossed this facial soap will work for me

I'll post pics once they're out of the mold and will update on my journey with this soap..

 

[shunt2011]

Just an FYI I use salt bars on my skin and have had amazing results as have many of my family members and customers. Your recipe may be a bit soft and I've never used beeswax so can't comment there. I would just give it a try and see if it works for you.

 

[jade-15]

Looking forwards to your updates. On my to do list is a face bar, (attempting to imitate my shop bought one) so will love to hear how this works for you! Good luck

 

[shivani]

Good luck!! Hope to hear good results after a month!!

 

[kikajess]

I feel your pain. I'm prone to cystic, and I hope to make a bar just for my face, someday. My plan is to HP the batch so I can superfat it specifically with hemp oil. Why hemp? Because it is non-comedogenic and I can find it at the store.

I'm looking forward to an update on your facial soap adventure!

 

[seven]

shunt, i am currently using a salt bar as well (while waiting for the facial soap to be ready). so far i think it's okay generally, i did see a few lil dots here and there, i think my skin is reacting to the new stuff. it's pretty minor and i'm not really worry about it. gonna wait a week or two to see how it goes... and yeah, the recipe is a bit soft as for the beeswax, i've read that it's supposed to be non-comedogenic. guess we'll just wait and see...


jade & shivani, thank you. i'll post updates


kikajess... there's nothing more annoying than adult acne hmmmm, why didn't i think about hemp before? i was already putting quite a bit of oils, i guess i was getting a bit confused, lol


i really reallyyyy needed this soap to work... dear soap god, please hear my prayers, amen

 

[user 12568]

I'm really interested in seeing how this soap turns out. I've got very dry skin (actually need to moisturise 2x/day with pure Olive Oil), but my wife is the opposite. I'll watch the thread for updates. Best of luck!

 

[shunt2011]

I still suffer from adult acne an have found that using salt bars Meadowfoam Seed Oil straight up to moisturize my nose and sometimes the rest of my face too as it is the only thing that seems to dry out is the best it's been in a long long time. When I do break out I find the sea salt helps clear things up a bit quicker too. You'll have to let us know how your recipe turns out.

 

[mariena]

I read that coconut is comedogenic. It is rated a 4 out of 5 on the scale. See link. I am also going to try and formulate a facial bar for myself.
https://www.beneficialbotanicals.com/facts-figures/comedogenic-rating.html

 

[sososo]

jojoba 5%
sunflower 10%
olive 40%
apricot kernel 5%
sweet almond 15%
castor 5%
coconut 15%
beeswax 5%

I would remove sunflower (short shelf life) and put instead olive. So, olive - 50%.
Usulay i use beeswax 3% from total oils and never count this in soapcalc.

 

[Lin]

coconut is very comedogenic. I've tried a few gentle facial bars but my skin didn't like them. Washing my skin every day always made it worse, I would wash every few days and just rinse my face inbetween and my skin looked best actually after rinse days until a certain point where I needed to do a deep cleansing and without it my face would start to get bad again.

Until I started the oil cleansing method. The first time I tried I used olive oil and my skin did NOT like that. I also think part of my face not liking it was frequently doing it in the shower, I'll get to that again. When I started with grapeseed oil and put together my routine my face really started clearing up, feeling smoother, and large pores on my nose getting noticeably smaller! I'm seriously loving it. I use about 1/5 castor oil to the grapeseed oil. I rub it in really well, apply a hot washcloth to steam open the pores, rewet the washcloth to steam again, wipe oil off, reverse washcloth and repeat. Then put a very light layer of avocado oil on the areas that get dry. If I get any dryness during the day I use avocado oil. Using too much castor in my mix left my skin tight and dry.

Only problem is... I still break out after a shower. Like, immediately after a shower. I no longer wash my face in the shower at all, but the water from washing my hair or something does it. I actually only wash my hair once a week, so that helps, but its a huge pain... I need to get a filtering shower head, I used to use one but during a move it got left behind. I'm trying to keep my face from going under the water when I shower at home. Showering at my bfs house helps, my skin much prefers his water! But I don't have a shower chair there.

 

[judymoody]

Check out the acne soap recipe on the teach soap site. It has PKO, safflower, and grapeseed, among other oils, if memory serves, as well as clay and essential oils. I make it with tea tree and lavender. Teenagers around my city sing my praises for this soap and it cleared up cystic acne for a gal who works at my hairdresser's. Give it a try!

My teenage daughter also does a sugar scrub periodically and that is helpful. It's just olive oil, sugar, and a drop of tea tree or lavender or lemongrass or just plain.

 

[Skatergirl46]

Check out the acne soap recipe on the teach soap site. It has PKO, safflower, and grapeseed, among other oils, if memory serves, as well as clay and essential oils. I make it with tea tree and lavender. Teenagers around my city sing my praises for this soap and it cleared up cystic acne for a gal who works at my hairdresser's. Give it a try!

My teenage daughter also does a sugar scrub periodically and that is helpful. It's just olive oil, sugar, and a drop of tea tree or lavender or lemongrass or just plain.

I am trying to find the recipe on Teach Soap and having difficulty.roblem:
My older son is having acne issues. He has started using the 15% neem soap that I made a while back and it's helping some. I'm going to make another batch of facial soap with only EO's for scent, and without CO. Not super fond of the neem smell but I think it will be worth dealing with. Thinking about doing 20% neem this time. Maybe I'll use Lemongrass EO. Would that smell be gross with the neem?

**Update** Well, I had some free time today so I decided to try this combo. of oils. All of them are supposed to be low on the comodogenicity list.

Lard
Safflower oil
Shea butter
Castor oil
Neem oil
Hemp oil

I added Lemongrass EO in the hope that it would cover some of the neem smell. I think it worked. I put my little soap ball (from scraping the crock pot) into the refrigerator to cool, and when I took it out about all I could smell was the Lemongrass. This batch should be free of anything irritating to my skin so we'll see how it handles the acne issue.

 

[seven]

Yep, i knew that CO is comedogenic, but i was thinking of a facial bar that at least have a small cleansing value. Here, it's hot and humid, so i need something that can take off those dirt from my face. The CO did come at the very last minute, as I was gonna leave it out of the recipe at 1st. I've been using a salt bar that i made myself while waiting for this soap to be ready and so far it is quite okay. Yes, my skin is still adjusting, you can feel and tell, but it's pretty normal..

The cleansing method with oil... wow, you really got me excited here, Lin grapeseed with a dash of castor, huh? hmmmm, might be worth a try. Perhaps after a day with full makeup.. I can ditch my shu cleansing oil and go with grapeseed instead. I have large pores too My nose is pretty blah with all those yucky dots..

Is there anything that can replace coconut that still has some cleansing values? I can't use lard or tallow. I might make another tiny batch (HP of course) tonight w/o the coconut..

 

[Trxflyer]

I am trying to find the recipe on Teach Soap and having difficulty.roblem:

Teach Soap Gentle Acne Soap Recipe - http://teachsoap.com/2012/03/26/gentle-acne-soap/

 

[Skatergirl46]

Teach Soap Gentle Acne Soap Recipe - http://teachsoap.com/2012/03/26/gentle-acne-soap/

Thank you!

 

[seven]

Teach Soap Gentle Acne Soap Recipe - http://teachsoap.com/2012/03/26/gentle-acne-soap/

grrrrr, i dont have pko and i dont have a clue where to buy it over here, dont think the supermarkets have it. we have tons of palm oil, but no pko, funny!

would it be the same if i use palm oil instead? cant seem to find the info about whether palm is comedogenic or not

 

[Obsidian]

Palm oil and palm kernel oil are different, you can't use them to sub each other. PKO is a good sub for coconut while palm oil is a sub for lard. You might have to order the pko online or do a google search for a local soap supply store.

 

[judymoody]

I am trying to find the recipe on Teach Soap and having difficulty.roblem:

Here you are!

http://teachsoap.com/2012/03/26/gentle-acne-soap/

 

[seven]

I promised an update about my facial soap. I've made 2 batches at the end, the other is w/o co. Been using both batches, so far so good. No unwanted reaction, like sudden new pimples and such. That said, i already prepped my skin for the transition from using a dermatologist cleanser to homemade soap by using a salt bar that i made. I did this for 2 weeks while waiting for the facial soaps to cure.

I still have some black and whiteheads, but i found they are not as aggressive as before. My cleansing routine is now, oil cleansing 1st (grapeseed + castor, thanks to another member who mentioned about this. I'm sorry i forgot who it was), followed by the facial soap. That, twice a day.

Perhaps it is too early to tell of the actual results, so i'll update again in a month or so.