What do you need?

Let the fun begin:

1. Prepare all ingredients and clean working space.

2. In a separated beaker gently melt shea butter (don’t exceed 70°C) and add jojoba oil .

3. When the mixture cools down (it has to be below 40°C), add essential oils* (I added a mixture of: sweet orange EO, grapefruit EO and lavender EO).

4. In a separated pot mix natron, citric acid, corn starch, buttermilk powder and rosehip powder. Make sure they are evenly mixed.

5. Add oil mixture from step 3 to the pot and mix evenly.

6. Mixture is now ready to be formed:) I’ve used the molds on the picture.

7. Be patient, it requires some patience when you’re forming bath bombs for the first time.

8. When you finish with shaping, your product has to “rest” for 24 hours in order for ingredients to bind and set.

FAQs + tips and tricks:

• I have problems with forming my bath bombs, what should I do?

  It may happen that they don’t hold the form. To prevent this, leave them to set in the mold for an hour and then gently remove it from the mold. Even when you’re satisfied with their shape, you have to leave them to set for at least 24 hours. I know..temptation.. but it’s worth waiting :)

• Where can I buy the ingredients?

  For the ingredients I’d recommend you the following 2 websites: https://naissance.com/ and https://www.primaveralife.com/ or directly in your local bio/cosmetic store.
  You can be very creative when choosing bar moulds, however, I suggest you to use silicon moulds in order to remove balm bars more easily.

• What do emollient, occlusive and INCI mean?

  Emollient – to smooth and soften your skin.
  Occlusive – a characteristic of an ingredient to provide a physical barrier to block water escaping from the skin.
  INCI - International Nomenclature of Cosmetic Ingredients. This is an universal, worldwide system of formal names for cosmetic ingredients and it’s based on the Latin or scientific name. An important reason for using this INCI name is that there may be several different trade names in use for an ingredient. By using INCI name, you can be 100% sure of the actual ingredient that you use.

• Can I replace or leave out any of the ingredients? 

  Of course, there is still a lot of room for you to be creative with the ingredients you have. I’d advise you to keep the the proportions of natron, citric acid and cornstarch.  

  • You can replace shea butter with another soft butter, for example mango butter.

  • Instead of jojoba oil you can use other carrier oils: sweet almond oil.  

• Which essential oils should I use and why? 

  Essential oils give a product wonderful natural fragrance and flavour.

  • You can replace sweet orange essential oil (EO) with: lavender EO, grapefruit EO, peppermint EO, etc. however, don’t exceed 1% w/w* of the whole formulation, meaning, don’t add more than 2g per 100g of final product in order to avoid skin sensitisation.

  • Be careful when using citrus essential oils (grapefruit, bergamot, lemon, lime), since they are photosensitive - meaning they may cause oversensitivity of skin to light. If you have a very sensitive skin, you may avoid the essential oils - don’t worry, cocoa butter already gives it a hint of chocolate flavour. 

• Is the product vegan? 

  No. But a slight change - skip the buttermilk powder – will make it vegan. Don’t worry, bombs will still be fizzy due to natron and citric acid.

• How long does do they last? 

  These bath bombs should last at least 3 months. Even longer, if you store them in a dark and cold place..

* % w/w: weight for weight" or "weight by weight", the proportion of a particular substance within a mixture, as measured by weight or mass.

1. EU Register on Nutrition and Health Claims