Palisade Peach

It's been a few months since I have participated in one of Amy Warden's Soap Challenges, and my current peach obsession propelled me to enter this month.

The current challenge is to create a Luna Swirl, which I did try earlier this year with some success.  I did not use high contrasting colors before, so this time around, although two of the colors are very similar, the others do contrast nicely.  So, we will see what we can make :)

The guest teacher this month is Christina Greenwood of Luna and the Leaf, and her Luna Swirl soaps are absolutely gorgeous!  Here are the examples from the tutorial.

Thinking peach for this entire process, I used oils infused with rhubarb, annatto and a lighter annatto that was mixed with natural soap batter.  For more of a white, I added some kaolin clay to the natural.  I scented the soap with Ginger Peach fragrance, with the addition of a few essential oils to ground it.  Here you can see my batters all ready to go - although the rhubarb is out of the shot...when you scroll down through the process, there are pictures of that color :)

I poured one third of the white into a separate pouring container to help me manage the amount of white to incorporate into each gradient.  I also set aside a few tablespoons of each color to use on the top.

I started with the rhubarb, so you can see the color that makes here in these photos.  The filming angle is not ideal, so I've included a picture of the gradient once it was poured.  The rhubarb does make such a lovely shade!

Next I poured the orange-white gradient.

And finally, the yellow/light orange gradient.  It's hard to see the difference between the two shades of orange, and if I were to do it again, maybe I would do a larger portion in green?  I really like the visual appeal of the green, orange and burgundy colors together.  It would also help if I didn't move the mold out of the camera's field of vision :)

I then added stripes of each individual color on the top, including introducing a bit of the green, prior to performing the hanger swirl.  I created my own swirl pattern in which I came in through the green to the center of the mold, then did several clockwise spirals, increasing the circumference of the motion, from the center out and then up the side where the red was.  I gave it a few more swirls for good measure, but wanted to see if I could produce a circular effect, to create an impression of the roundness of a peach.

I added the remaining soap batter to the top and gave it an elegant swirl.  These pictures show the different shades of orange a little better.

I do love the morning cuts!  I was so excited to get into this one to see how it turned out. 

Two things could be improved upon. 

1) The contrast between colors.  I feel there's not enough distinction between the two oranges, and my white isn't super white.  Next time I'll try brine to bring the white out more, although I'm not sure how that will affect the fluidity of the batter, and that is certainly important with this one.

2) The swirl pattern did not give as much movement as I had hoped for.  I'll have to experiment more with some of the patterns that Christina had suggested.

What a lovely bar! 
I really enjoyed this process, and I will certainly be doing this again! 
Thank you Christina for creating this beautiful technique!!!
And, Thank You Amy for bringing the whole world of soapers together to collaborate and experiment :).

I'm pleased you made it to the end! 
Please leave a comment below!!!

Taralyn