September 2015 Clyde Slide Swirl Soap Challenge

This is the second soap challenge I have entered. It is put on monthly by Amy Warden from Great Cakes Soapworks.

The challenge was to conquer The Clyde Slide swirl with feathering. This technique was created by Clyde Yoshida of Vibrant Soaps. The procedure looks easy enough to do, but is difficult to achieve with the feathering inside.

Amy said the key to this swirl was thin trace – I am the queen of super thin trace, so I figured I got this – piece of cake!! I planned on making 4 batches, as I was out of Lavender and wanted two kinds and I had some new fall fragrances to try for the other two.

My 1st, 3rd, & 4th batches were super thin – to the point that when I cut them, one looked like mud (fortunately as it’s been curing the other colors have come out). The other two had absolutely no feathers, in spite of me following the directions to the letter. Grr….

The 2nd batch was the one I thought I screwed up. Half of the fragrance oil I used was a bit old and the batter got much thicker than the others. I figured this one was doomed….and it turned out to be the one that worked!!

This is my 2nd batch & the one I submitted in the challenge –

Lavender & Herb soap

Lavender & Herb Soap in Clyde Slide Swirl

I used 5 colors: BB (Brambleberry) Green Oxide with black, Titanium Oxide white, TKB (TKB Trading) EZB Lakeside green, TKB Magic Violet, TKB The Fox purple with black. Plus mica oils for the top: BB Vivacious Violet & BB Snow Flake Silver Mica.

A faux funnel pour in the pot and then into the loaf mold.

Soap poured into the pot using a faux funnel pour

I swirled the top with Vivacious Violet & Snow Flake Silver mica oils.

The resulting soaps:

Lavender & Herb Soap in Clyde Slide

Do you see the Owl reflected in the soaps?

Owls in soap? Two live owls have been pestering me this week – sitting on my roof and hooting all night!! Now they are appearing in my soap!

Here are the other batches I made:

I made a 5th batch because I really wanted to get the Clyde Slide right and not just by accident. I was determined to get my batter to the correct consistency. And of course, I over blended it and it was the thickest of them all. But it actually had consistent feathering in every single bar!

This is the Juniper & Green Tea soap. The colors were not what I had envisioned and the feathering was not as pronounced, which is why I submitted the other soap.

The colors I used were: BA (Bulk Apothecary) Lavender with leftover dark purple, TKB #30 Christmas red, CC (Crafters Choice) Yellow Locking mica, TKB chromium oxide dark green, and TKB Neon soft pink.

Juniper & Green Tea in Clyde Slide

 

Lavender Green Tea

This is the 1st batch I made – Lavender Green Tea  and I felt like I really nailed it!! But the inside said otherwise, as it turned out a bit muddy and no feathering.

I split the batch in five equal parts and the colors I used are some of my favorite: TKB The Fox (purple) with black, TKB Magic Violet, BB Radiant plum, BB Aqua Pearl Mica, and Titanium Dioxide white. And I topped it off with BB Vivacious Violet Mica & BB Snow Flake silver mica oils.

I used a crinkle cutter on half of my soaps, to give it some depth, but now that it’s been curing for a week, the colors are starting to pop:

Next is batch #4, again with no feathering. This is a new fall scent by Branbleberry – Rustic Woods & Rum – and smells totally awesome! Of course this scent has vanilla, so I picked colors to work with the discoloring.

The colors used were recommended for this fragrance: BB Cappuccino mica (with fo); BB Merlot mica (fo & vanilla stabilizer); BB Ultramarine blue (fo & stab); TKB Chromium Oxide Green (no fo); BB Gold Sparkle mica (no fo) & topped with Cappuccino & Copper Mica oils.

Rustic Woods & Rum

 

Batch #3 contained another new fall scent from Brambleberry: Warm Flannel, which smells surprisingly good.

To get along with the brown discoloring I used BB Cappuccino Mica (with 1/2 of the fo), BB Merlot mica (with fo & vanilla stabilizer), BB Indigo Blue & Ultramarine blue (fo & stabilizer), TKB #40 Christmas red, and TKB Gold Lame mica. I used an equal amount of batter with each color, but is seems like a lot of the gold & blue got eaten up by the reds.

I did try cutting a piece of soap horizontally, as one soaper recommended to get feathers, but it was all lines and unattractive. At least it smells good!

Warm Flannel

This challenge was more than I had bargained for, as you can see with all the efforts I made…it definitely was very challenging.
A record 184 soapers signed up and of those, 95 entered their soaps. Two tied for 3rd & two tied for 4th place….I finished next – in 5th place. I am very pleased, as it was a tough challenge.