Indigo Powder in CP Soap

[xyxoxy]

I bought some Indigo powder a while back and am only now getting around to using it.

I was going to blend it into a liquid oil and then add it into half my batch at trace for swirling.

Any thoughts on how much to use PPO?
Is there a better way to add it than blending with oil?
Will it bleed into the non-colored soap?

Thanks!

 

[Guest]

I have not personally used Indigo powder, am thinking about using Alkanet. But I did a little research and found the following info, hope it helps;
The article said that Indigo powder will create a beautiful blue hue in your soaps. The shade is very similar to that of blue denim. A little goes a VERY long way with this natural soap colorant. Use just 1/8 - 1/4 teaspoon per 5 pound batch of soap. 1 ounce of this product can color more then 100 pounds of soap! I think one has to be careful with the amount used, unfortunately it doesn't say if you mix it with oil or water. Myself I would try blending a small amount with some olive oil in a jar and see what the result is.

 

[xyxoxy]

Thanks... I am notorious for over-coloring soap when trying new colorants so I'll go sparingly. I've heard indigo can morph a little greenish in soap... or maybe that's because of adding it to yellowish oils. I'm using hemp oil so I expect a blue-green anyway. Really curious to see what results.

 

[SideDoorSoaps]

I have used indigo powder in soap at 1/4 tsp per pound of soap. Mixed it with the soap and then added it back into the batch. It was all one colored soap. The results were interesting. It's more of a baby blue than denim that I was thinking and there were speckles of the powder that didn't mix it and lent it self to bleeding in the soap. But I think the soap came out really pretty with the purplish bleeds. Hope this helps!

 

[agriffin]

Indigo does best when added to the lye water.

 

[xyxoxy]

Thank you!

I put the indigo powder into a plastic pitcher and added a little bit of my recipe's water to disperse it. I used a little less than 1/4 tsp powder and just a little splash of water and swirled it around very well. It did disperse but in a very strange inky looking way.

I made a 2KG batch (approx 4 pounds) and split half of it into this pitcher. So this works out to approx 1/8 tsp PPO. And I must say that was plenty! In combination with the dark green hemp oil and the light yellow olive oil I ended up with a sort of jade green. I'll post pics when I un-mold and slice it.

This time I was doing a swirl so I probably couldn't have added to the lye water unless I did 2 separate batches at the same time. But I will try that next time as I would like to do a solid color batch next with lighter oils.