How To - No Soap Face Cleanser in a Jar


If you like my cleansing bar formulas, you may just love this fun little number. It's a marriage of a cleansing bar with my flower, food and dirt cleansers – except this one goes in a jar.

Hmm, Bar-in-a-jar? Flowers and bar in a jar? (we'll have to work on the name).

For this soap-free product, ayurvedic amla powder is combined with rose and a few other flowers to create a morning cleanser that not only refreshes and moisturizes the skin, but smells divine without the addition of essential oils.

The ingredients can be mixed and matched any way you please, so get ready to make your own, 100% personalized creation!


A Question of Proportion




To get the perfect texture, it is necessary to combine oils, butters and powders to achieve a soft-yet-stiff mixture that is both easy to scoop out and easily applied to the skin without drip or drag. You also want to ensure the powders and clays stay evenly distributed.

Depending on which climate (and time of year) you are in, you may want to tweak the butter/oil proportions for a stiffer or softer mix. Also, replacing a harder butter like cocoa or mango butter with a softer butter - such as shea or sal - will make a difference in texture as well.

Choose what works best for you and make skin-cleansing magic.

The LisaLise Basic Bar-in-a-Jar Formula

20% butter
30% oil
30% clay
19,2% flowers/herbs/food (see links below to flower, dirt and food cleansers for details)
0.8% preservative


Here's how I made my cleanser (100gr)
20 gr cocoa butter
15 gr castor oil
15 gr almond oil
20 gr white clay
10 gr yellow clay
19,2 gr mixed powdered rose, amla, calendula, chamomile and rhassoul
0,8 gr (18 drops) preservative


Important Formula-Creating Tip

Always measure using weight! This is the only way you can know exactly how much of each ingredient there is in your recipe. For example, oil is lighter than water, so 15 ml of oil is not the same as 15 grams of oil.

Are you worried about how to measure oils by weight? It's easy-peasy! Simply put a beaker/container on a scale and pour oil into it until the scale shows the desired weight.

Extra bonus tip: do not be tempted to leave preservative out of this recipe! Because the product is in a jar, it is undoubtedly going to come into contact with water (think scooping up product with wet fingers, etc).  It is therefore necessary to use a preservative. Broad spectrum preservative is the way to go when you are including plant materials in a formula.


 Method 


  1. Place the butter in a heat-resistant beaker and melt slowly over low heat
  2. Add oils and stir
  3. Add the dry ingredients and preservative
  4. Stir
  5. Pour into a sterilized jar and refrigerate until set.
  6. Enjoy


Above: Here is my first batch after a few days use. The initial batch set just a bit stiffer than I liked, so I adjusted the recipe. The second batch had the perfect texture (for me). The recipe above is for batch 2.


 No Soap? How Does that Work?

As the ingredients are basically the same, this cleanser works like my cleansing bars. Check out this FAQ about this type of soap-free cleanser and find a tutorial on how to use a soap-free cleanser at the bottom of the page.


Do Tell

If you make this cleanser - I'd love to read your feedback!

Other Cleanser How-To's on This Blog

Cleansing Bar - Basic
Cleansing Bar - Oatmeal and Pink Clay
Flowers Dirt and Food - 1
Flowers Dirt and Food - 2
Check the How-To Page for More

Comments

María said…
Amazing idea :)
Have you thought in including in your formula aritha powder? Aritha (also known as reetha) is just soapnut powder, so like that it's possible to give an extra kick with the cleaning properties in a 100% natural way. Also, saponines, being surfactants, may help to emulsify some of the fat, improving rinsing.
It's just an idea ;)
LisaLise said…
María, you never cease to amaze me with your great input. Thank you! I am now on my way to check out Aritha powder. I love the idea!
dolma said…
Could you recommend a preservative available at Aromazon? Would Cosgard be appropriate, for example? Thanks.
dolma said…
Could you recommend a preservative available at Aromazon? Would Cosgard be appropriate, for example? Thanks.
LisaLise said…
Hi Dolma - I'd probably go with Naticide if you're talking about AromaZone as the supplier. :)
Anonymous said…
Hello Dolma!
I am really looking forward to making this recipe. Do you need to keep it refrigerated?
LisaLise said…
Hey there Anon - If you follow the formula as described it doesn't need to be refrigerated. Note: you need to add a preservative to this!
Unknown said…
Hi Lise, where I live I am able to buy only Geogard 221 (Cosgard) as a natural preservative. Someone else asked, but you advised to use Naticide. Is it possible that Geogard 221 can work in this cleanser in a jar? I have already bought Geogard 221. Looking forward to your reply.
LisaLise said…
HI Karin,

I have had success with cosgard in several formulations but have never tried it in an anhydrous mix such as this one. My best suggestion is to give it a try. :)
Laurie said…
This is amazing, I made it with oats, clay, rose powder, calendula powder and kokum butter. With a few drops of chamomile oil. So dreamy! My skin feels so soft!
LisaLise said…
HI Laurie - that sounds lovely! I do love these no soap cleansers immensely - thanks for your input!
Ahlam Mansur said…
Hi.
I just formulated this yesterday and I loved it.
I've used shea butter, fuller's earth clay, oats, ashwagandha powder, aloevera powder and sweet almond oil.

I never liked how cleansers made my skin feel so this is a good choice.
Thank you and God Bless you.

Regards from Kenya.
LisaLise said…
Helo Ahlam - How wonderful you have found something that works for you. I love your list of ingredients and may just have to try this myself! Stay safe and healthy :D
moody said…
Hi Lisa,
I love the way you work :)
was just wondering, with the addition of an surfactant or saponins would it make an effective'conditioning' cleanser for kinky type hair.
LisaLise said…
Hi Moody - Sounds like this might be with a try-- start with a small amount of fine powder (keep it under 5%). If you want to add a liquid surfactant, you're going to need to consider adding a preservative, and may have trouble keeping everything from separating without additional ingredients. I'd go with the powdered surfactant first off and see how it turns out. Might as well start with the one easiest to try :)