Trying out the Clyde Slide (September Soap Challenge Club)

This month’s Soap Challenge Club technique was the Clyde Slide. Well, I had to participate in this one because it has such a cool rhymey name. 🙂 I have been a little busier than usual with the new school year and sports and music and home school and . . . well, my normal hectic life. So, as a result, I only did two soaps in this technique: Berries and Bird of Paradise.

I was looking over my recent soap pics and I think I may be in danger of being in a color rut!! Oh no! Basically, my soaps tend to be blue/purple or pink/orange. HMMM. Well, okay, those are my favorite color combos, but maybe I need to branch out. After all this deep color thinking, I have decided to (gasp) add green into one of the soaps this month. (I KNOW!!) So, yes, green is a bit out of my comfort zone for soaping, but I paired it with purple and pink, which are very much IN my comfort zone, so it’s not too scary. 🙂 Here’s how the experimenting went:

• Berries

I have been experimenting lately with using a fragrance that accelerates as a design element. For this soap, I used Grapefruit Bellini in the purple layer at the bottom. I added the fragrance, poured it, and then waited a few minutes for it to set up. Then I used a knife to make a design in it. I was going for a wave, because I thought it would look cool with a Clyde Slide on top of it. Since I used my regular slow-moving recipe, the rest of the batter was nice and thin for the swirl layer. I used Black Raspberry Vanilla and Sweet Orange Chili Pepper to scent that part. The result is a very berry-ish scent, with just a bit of  grapefruit to cut through the sweetness. I like it! My favorite part of this loaf is the bars that have a guitar-looking swirl. SOOO Cool! Here’s the video:

• Bird of Paradise

And here, folks, is the soap we’ve all been waiting for. It has GREEN. Not a lot, of course. Baby steps. For this soap, I used my regular slow moving recipe and Acai Berry scent. I thought the batter was a little too thin for the Berries Soap, so I used the no heat added method of mixing the soap (add hot lye water to solid oils to melt them instead of pre-melting). This results in a slightly thicker batter (for my recipe, which contains lard). I think this was effective, since the feathered markings are more distinct on this batch.

I chose the name after cutting. Somehow it just reminds me of those lovely flowers. I love the graceful, free flowing feel of this technique. A big thanks to Clyde of Vibrant Soaps for sharing his technique and to Amy Warden of Great Cakes Soapworks for choosing it as the theme this month! Here’s the video:

And here are a few more photos of these two soap batches: