You might want to make your own homemade soap because you want to avoid certain ingredients in store-bought soap, or because it saves money, or just for the fun of mixing your own scents and molding them into decorative shapes.

Making soap from scratch isn’t a simple process, and you will need to be careful with some ingredients. Make sure you understand the dangers and how to avoid them before you start.

Soap making methods

Melt and Pour

This is the simplest method, but it can be used to make the most complex and artsy soaps. You just melt a pre-made soap base, add in any other ingredients you want, pour it into a mold, and let it cool and harden.

The way this method can get complex is when you’re making layers and decorative elements to make an amazing-looking soap. (See the Mermaid Soap in the recipes below.)

Rebatching

You can start with “rebatching” your own soap, using another soap (like Ivory, which already has the lye) as a base. Start with a smallish batch of homemade soap right in your blender, following the instructions here. You can also make liquid soap in a blender.

Whatever method you choose, here’s where it gets fun: the soap recipes. You can get very creative with the ingredients.

Anything you want to use for scent is fine, but you can also put in ingredients like milk and honey or coffee grinds (great for exfoliation). You may also want to be aware of how certain oils help your skin.

Soap Making Gear

If you’re totally new to making handmade soap, you may want to start off with a soap making kit. They make everything simple and self-contained. If you’d rather learn from scratch, you’ll need:

Lye. Unless you plan on never using lye based soap recipes.

Or you could use a melt and pour soap base, like oatmeal, goats’ milk glycerine or shea butter.

Liquid Colors. Add a few drops of these to your soap bars to change their color.

Soap Molds. You can get these in so many different shapes and patterns. It’s a really fun way to make your soap bars even more personal – especially if you’re gifting them.

Soap Cutters. If you prefer to make one big block of soap and then cut it into bars, soap cutters are the tool for you. It’s much easier than working with a knife.

Gifting Homemade Soap

If you’re planning to make natural soap as a gift for friends or family, consider pairing soap with dishes. This beautiful stainless steel soap dish looks beautiful with any bar or decorative soap.

So do these white soap saver dishes designed to catch all the dripping soap – they’re practical and beautiful. Or you can go with much, much fancier soap dishes. You can also find soap dishes shaped like turtles.

Another option instead of dishes is fingertip towels. These can be really gorgeous and useful.

These beautiful little kraft paper gift boxes with hemp cords are perfect for gifting soap bars and smaller decorative soap pieces.

If you enjoy making your own soap, you might want to learn how to make glue at home!

Creating your own

Making soap at home can be a very fun and rewarding hobby. Once you’ve made a few batches from recipes, you get a feel for how it’s done and then you can create your own soap recipes.

Decorative soap bars can be great as gifts, too (and much less expensive, and more thoughtful, than pretty bars from stores).

Homemade Soap Recipes

The following DIY soap recipes vary in difficulty. Not all of them use lye. Some of them are simple re-batching or "melt and pour" recipes which are more suitable if you want to keep it simple. Others are cold process soap recipes, which lets you make fantastic-looking layered or ombre bars.