How Do I Naturally Color Soap?Updated 3 months ago

Many people are curious about how they can color their homemade soaps naturally. Of course, there are vibrant soap pigments and dyes, but what are my options for coloring soap? More importantly for all natural soap makers, How Do I Naturally Color Soap? Well, its simple, just use some cosmetic herbs. While not every herb is pigmented, there are many herbs out there that can be used to provide some wonderful colors. Plus, many herbs come with some added benefits for the body. We have compiled a short natural soap colorants list that can be handy for the average soap maker.

How Do You Add Herbs To Soap

Since herbs are a great way to naturally color your homemade soaps, you will want to know the ways that you can incorporate them into your recipes. Depending on the form that they come in, there are a few methods you may want to know. First, we have the easiest herb in incorporate, which is powdered herbs. The powder can simply be added to the recipe either before the CP soap reaches trace or before pouring your MP soap. Also, you can add the herb to vegetable glycerin to break up chunks before adding it, but this isn't always necessary.

Next, we have the whole herbs, which include things like flower petals or cinnamon sticks. While there are instances where you want to add whole herbs to your soap, you don't need this for coloring. So, these herbs can either be added in tea form or an oil infusion. For the tea all you need to do is steep your herbs in hot water to create a tea and use this as the water portion of your recipe. If you aren't using water in your recipe, then you will want to do an oil infusion. So, you will need to create an herb oil by either allowing your herbs to soak in one of your oils for 4-6 weeks or add them to the pot as you oils melt. After, you will just need to strain out the herbs.

Creating a Yellow Color

One fun color that you can achieve naturally in your homemade soaps is yellow. You can use highly pigmented herbs, like Annatto, Saffron, or Turmeric Ground, that are perfect for adding some color to your natural soaps. Plus, there are added benefits of turmeric powder in soap that you can get from a synthetic colorant. This cosmetic herb is well known for its many health benefits, which includes benefits for skin care. Turmeric is an anti-inflammatory, which has been found to help reduce redness or dark circles. Also, this herb is antibacterial, which could be beneficial for a clear face. Furthermore, this pigmented herb has antioxidant properties, which is a property that is perfect for anti-aging products. If you'd like to learn more about this herb, then check out Turmeric Class.

How to Color Soap Orange Naturally

Another great natural colorant is Carrot Powder, which provides a creamy orange color. Plus, this herb is absolutely wonderful for the skin, as it is full of vitamins and minerals that skin loves. This herb repairs and tones the skin, reduces wrinkles and scars, improves circulation, increases elasticity, and nourishes the skin with beta carotene. Also, since this herb tends to clump you may want to use vegetable glycerin to incorporate this lovely herb.

How to Naturally Color Soap Pink

Another fun color that you can include in your natural homemade soap recipes is pink. Actually, there are a few different herbs that you can choose between to get some pretty pink hues. First, we have the Hibiscus Flower Powder. This herb is gorgeous, smells lovely, and is amazing for your skin. What's not to love? In fact, hibiscus has been referred to as "the Natural Botox plant", and for good reason. This herb is known to be gentle as it moisturizes, cleanses, tones, and reduces wrinkles! If you want to know more, check out our Hibiscus Class.

A second option for coloring your soaps is the Beet Root Powder herb. One great thing about this her is that it is perfect for taking care of your face. In fact, this herb has been known to work great for reducing skin blemishes, pore size, and acne. If you'd like to learn more about this herb, then check out our Beet Root Powder Class.

Lastly, you can create a gorgeous pink color for your bath and body products using the Rose Clay Powder. This pink cosmetic clay is gentle, natural ingredient that contains kaolinite. This herb gently exfoliates, draws out toxins, reduces inflammation, and increases circulation. Plus, it is gentle for even the most sensitive skin. It is a powerful and kind herb that is perfect for creating naturally colored soaps.

Natural Pink Soap Colorants for Melt and Pour

Also, you can use the Rose Clay Powder to create naturally colored melt and pour soap. We used this cosmetic pink clay in our Swirled Melt and Pour Soap Recipe, as herbs are the best way to be able to swirl soap. While this recipe also uses pink soap pigment to create a more vibrant pink, this clay can work perfectly all by itself too. In the Perfectly Pampered Shaving Soap Recipe, we used rose clay to perfectly color the bottom portion of this gorgeous bath and body recipe.

Creating a Brown Color

Also, you can use herbs to create a natural brown color in your homemade soaps. One herb that you can include in soaps is the Black Walnut Hulls Powder. Not only can this herb be used to create a brown hue, but it can be added to vibrant colors to mute the color. Furthermore, this cosmetic herb has some fantastic properties for the skin! This herb has antifungal properties that have been known to treat acne, herpes, athlete s foot, cold sores, and even warts. Plus, it can even be used to treat yeast infections and ringworm. If you would like to learn more about the benefits of this herb, then take a look at our Black Walnut Hulls Class.

Another great herb that can be used to create a deep chocolate brown is Cocoa Powder Organic. This cosmetic herb was used as an organic colorant and for its beneficial properties. This cosmetic herb promotes healthy skin tissues, firms and renews skin cells, and promotes healthy skin cell development. Plus, it works as an antioxidant and helps to repair any damaged skin, improves blood flow to the skin, helps to improve skin hydration and complexion. It even absorbs UV light into the skin. If you want to learn more about this fantastic herb, then you can find out more in our Cocoa Powder Class.

Naturally Colored Chocolate Soaps

Cocoa powder is a perfect way to naturally color chocolate scented soaps. We have included this lovely herb in many recipes for both its perfect coloring properties and lovely skin properties. One delicious looking soap recipe that only uses this herb as a colorant is the Hot Fudge Brownies Cold Process Soap Recipe. This naturally colored cold process soap looks almost good enough to eat! Plus, you can you this herb to make some yummy melt and pour soaps, too. The Chocolate Cream Cheese Cupcake Soap Recipe is a scrumptious soap that is just the perfect shade of chocolate!

How to Color Soap Black

Another color that you can create naturally with herbs is black. Adding Activated Charcoal Powder is a sure way to get a pure black color in your homemade soaps. Not only will you get a fantastic color, but this cosmetic ingredient is wonderfully cleansing. Activated Charcoal is an adsorbent, which means that it is able to hold onto molecules and trap them on the surface. So, when you wash off the activated charcoal the grime goes along with it. Further, it has the power to pull dirt and oil both off your skin and out of your pores. Overall, this makes activated charcoal a powerful cosmetic ingredient that you will adore for soap-making.

Naturally Colored Black Soaps

We included this cleansing cosmetic herb in our own homemade soap recipes. First, we incorporated activated charcoal into the Activated Charcoal Soap Recipe. The herb enhances this soap to create an even deeper cleansing soap. Plus, the MP soap bars have a stunning jet black layer that works perfectly with the poppy seeds in the clear layer. Such a fun and natural homemade soap!

Also, we included this fantastic colorant in our Total Hot Man CP Soap Recipe. While the red is a soap pigment, the black portion of the bar is all thanks to activated charcoal. So, you can tell that this herb works great in both CP soap and MP soap. Plus, this gorgeous bar of soap will maintain the powerful cleaning properties of activated charcoal. So, this bar of soap is great all around!

How to Color Soap Green Naturally

Also, you can use herbs to provide your soaps with a natural green color! Many herbs that come from plants containing chlorophyll will do the trick, but here are a few that we like to use in soaps. First, we have Parsley Leaf Powder. Not only does this herb provide a nice, earthy green color, but it will perfectly nourish your skin with nutrients. Also, you can use Green Tea Powder in any soaps to create a nice green color. Plus, this lovely herb will provide gentle exfoliation to the skin along with beneficial antioxidant properties. Either would be perfect for making some homemade soaps!

How to Color Soap Blue or Purple

While many other herbs can be used to naturally color any bath and body product, the Alkanet Root is for cold process soap only. This means that you, unfortunately, won't be able to use this to make natural purple MP soap. However, you can create some pretty gorgeous and natural cold process soaps! We don't carry this particular herb, but we still thought it was a great one to mention since it can provide a pretty purple color. Also, this can be used in differing amounts to provide a pink or even a blue color!

What is Alkanet

If you are curious to learn more about Alkanet as a natural colorant, then Lovely Green's Growing Alkanet. Lovely Green uses a touch of this very herb to lightly color her typical lavender soap. It is a natural, light purple hue that is very pretty. The color was especially for a lavender soap! So, you will definitely want to check this herb out.

Reach Out to Us

We hope that you have enjoyed all of these options for naturally coloring your homemade soaps! These herbs are just some of the most common herbs that we know of or have used in the past. If you know of or use any other herbs that you use for your naturally colored soaps, we would love to hear about your favorite cosmetic herbs for soapmaking. Also, feel free to ask us any questions that you may have about natural colorants or soaping in general. We are happy to help! You can reach out to us on social media. There is our Facebook page and Instagram account. We can't wait to hear from you!