In-Depth Soapmaking
Every year, the students of the TALONS program take part in a self-directed project where everyone is asked to choose a topic of their choice. This topic should be an area of your passion, something you are open to learn or improve on. We present this new or improved skill on In-depth Night, where family, alumni, and others come to see the projects.
For my project, I chose soap-making, which, as the title suggests, is the making of soap. Even when I was first wondering my area for In-depth, I knew that I wanted to do a physical or hands-on activity. In the beginning I was considering doing a sport of some sort, but then I came to realize my interest in beauty and body care. I finally narrowed down my topic to soap making when on Christmas 2011, I was given a delicately handmade, blueberry-scented soap that was decorated to make it look as if a frog was swimming. I figured that although I have tons of boring, store-bought soap at home, it was be interesting and fun to create soap from scratch out of naturally fresh ingredients.
One of the main parts of In-Depth is finding a mentor that has experience in your skill. I had originally planned one of my mom’s friend to by my mentor, but she just moved far away just a week ago. So I googled around for any stores of private businesses including hand-made soap and I came up with the result of a store called Cranberry Lane. I have already email them, and next week I’m scheduled to meet one of the employees who actually make soap and other bodycare products they sell in the store. In the meanwhile, I will due some researching so that I am aware of the basic idea of soapmaking.
