Can fragrance be replenished in cured soap? Yes but...

[Shirley-D]

I am disappointed that some fragrances are weak or disappear too soon--and the cost, phew $$$!
I have been taking notes from the forum on what would work best for my next purchases. Thanks everyone. I'm grateful for all the help and support on this forum (especially when my beautiful lab died).

I wondered if the fragrance oil could be replenished in the soaps already cured. The answer is yes, but don't do it. This is not a recommendation, and surely is not safe. However, I am a curious cat, so I opened the vault and removed two bars of unscented, uncolored soaps from the treasury for an experiment.

I kept one as the control and set the other in a shallow puddle of WSP's Nag Champa. It is the darkest coloring FO I have seen, so it would show up if it were to be absorbed by the white soap. (No TD by the way, just naturally white soap.) A few days later I turned it over and voila!

The center looks lighter than the perimeter because I didn't realize the plate was slightly domed, and therefore had less FO to absorb. Anyway, I had also splashed a bit on top of the opposite side. So, on cutting it open I see the FO has been absorbed in by 1/4 inch in places! WOW! It CAN absorb more FO.

So now I am even more curious. Will applying even more fragrance cause more absorption? Someone will have to do that experiment, I can't afford to waste more expensive FO, LOL! But what else can I do with this? Maybe a few polka dots? A monogram? Well, I did a stencil of a kitty. It wasn't perfect because the FO dissolved the plastic stencil. I should have known it would do that, live and learn.

This was interesting to do and kinda fun, but I consider this soap to be unsafe to use. Undiluted FO can burn the skin. My house smelled great for a while though.

 

[TheGecko]

You can if you rebatch your soap. You MIGHT be able to stick the soap in an airtight box with an open bottle of FO and see what happens. But yeah, the way you did it, very unsafe to use.

 

[Zing]

I have never used fragrance oils. I use essential oils. When I box up my cured soaps, I stick in a couple of cotton balls scented with the essential oil(s) I used in that batch.

 

[Shirley-D]

You can if you rebatch your soap. You MIGHT be able to stick the soap in an airtight box with an open bottle of FO and see what happens. But yeah, the way you did it, very unsafe to use.

Ahh! @TheGecko, rebatch. I was going to toss the dark one and try to scrape off the kitty from the other. It was just idle curiosity; you can tell I retired recently, LOL. But yes, I could scrape off the dark parts and rebatch, thanks. I hate waste.

 

[Shirley-D]

I have never used fragrance oils. I use essential oils. When I box up my cured soaps, I stick in a couple of cotton balls scented with the essential oil(s) I used in that batch.

Thanks for that tip @Zing. I take it this helps keep the scent in the soap...like block its escape because the box already has lots of scent in the air around the soaps. I will try that with my FO soaps.