This Twilight Foaming Clay Scrub looks a bit dark, and it gets darker when it gets wet… so dark that you might be wondering how it could actually make your face cleaner. So dark that you’re probably thinking you should hide your white towels (you aren’t wrong there). But trust me… there’s magic in that charcoaly darkness. Cleansing, detoxifying, lightly exfoliating magic.
Following the popularity of my Gentle Foaming Clay Scrub, I wanted to branch out and continue to play with some powdered surfactants and see what happened. I order a few more from Windy Point—some more SCI (Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate) and some SLSa (Sodium Lauryl Sulfoacetate)—so I could have myself a sudsy party. They both get 1/10 ratings from Skin Deep, meaning they’re considered safe, which is awesome. If you don’t want to use ’em, ground soap will do, but definitely won’t have the same effect.
Safety wise, you’re going to need a dust mask for this project. Inhaling powders is bad for you, and when we whip them up in a coffee grinder they become especially easy to inhale. Wear your dust mask. And don’t get a crappy disposable one that’s basically just a cardboard version of a jock strap. Invest in something proper. These are your lungs! You need ’em!
I decided to roll with a blend of white white kaolin clay (USA / Canada) and rhassoul clay for the base of the scrub. Kaolin is very silky, and I wanted a bit of exfoliation, so that’s where the rhassoul comes in. I used fine rhassoul, though I imagine the coffee grinder would take a coarse rhassoul down to a fine one if that’s all you have.
SCI and SLSa are both gentle surfactants. SCI is the milder of the two, while SLSa offers better bubbly goodness. So, a blend of the two that leans towards the SCI side of things should be very mild with awesome lather.
Up next; some detoxifying activated charcoal (it’s amazing for troublesome skin!) and some healing (and mildly exfoliating) calendula petals. The activated charcoal is what gives this scrub its characteristic colour, and yes, it can stain white things. I don’t recommend combining this scrub with white wash cloths.
Last but not least, some oils to help weigh this powder down and make it smell amazing. I used a few drops of sea buckthorn seed oil that I got from Swanson Vitamins (its surprisingly difficult to find in Canada!). The seed oil is significantly less orange than the fruit oil, which is nice for applications where you don’t want to add that extra oompa-loompa flair to your complexion 😉 Sea buckthorn seed oil is pressed from the seeds of Hippophae rhamnoides, which is a thorny shrub that originated in Nepal but has since spread all over Europe and Asia (and to Canada—it grows on the prairies here!). Rich in vitamins A, C, and E, plus linoleic acid and alpha-linoleic acid, it’s pretty good stuff for the skin. I’ll use it as post-scrub hydration as well so I can really reap the benefits 🙂
For essential oils I went with a warm blend of citrussy bergamot, warm ginger, and sweet rose geranium. This blend smells mostly of warm citrus, with an undertone of floral sweetness that brightens the blend without being cloying.
In the end you’ll have a lovely, lightweight scrub that foams up nicely, cleans beautifully, and delivers a wee dose of exfoliation to boot. I like this Twilight Foaming Clay Scrub, and I think you will, too!
Twilight Foaming Clay Scrub
2 tablespoons white kaolin clay (USA / Canada)
1 tablespoon rhassoul/ghassoul clay
1 teaspoon activated charcoal
1/2 teaspoon calendula petals
1/2 teaspoon Sodium Cocoyl Isethionate (SCI) (USA / Canada) or 2 teaspoons finely ground soap (see note below for a how-to)
1/4 teaspoon Sodium Lauryl Sulfoacetate or 2 teaspoons finely ground soap (see note below for a how-to)15 drops sea buckthorn seed oil
13 drops bergamot essential oil
10 drops ginger essential oil (CO2 extracted is best for a proper gingery scent)
2 drops rose geranium essential oil (optional)If you have either SCI or SLSa, but not both, feel free to just use 3/4 teaspoon of whichever one you do have. A liquid surfactant will not work here.
Start by putting on your dust mask since we’ll be working with fine powders and whirring them around in our DIY coffee grinder—you don’t want to inhale fine powders, it’s bad for your lungs.
Start by combining the clays, charcoal, calendula petals, and surfactants (or soap) in your coffee grinder and blending them together for thirty seconds. Leave the lid on the grinder for at least three minutes to let the dust settle when you’re done grinding, rapping the top and sides of the lid sharply with the back of a spoon to knock the powder down (it has a tendency to climb up the sides of the lid and then fall out when you take the lid off).
Give the powder a bit of a stir with a small spoon to make sure everything has incorporated well and then scatter the drops of jojoba and essential oils over the powder, giving it a gentle stir to cover the drops with some dry powder (this helps them blend in rather than flying up to the top of the lid and sticking there). Blend everything together for another thirty seconds, doing the three minute wait + spoon bashing bit again.
That’s it! Spoon it into a wee jar and you’re done. The one I used is a cute vintage find from a local antique shop (which means no, I cannot tell you where to buy one haha).
To use, spoon a generous half a teaspoon of the scrub into your palm, combine it with a bit of warm water, and work it up between your hands before massaging it into your face and rinsing off. Take care when you’re wetting it to not accidentally “pouf” a bunch of it out of your hands—that’ll make a mess!
I recommend using a spoon to scoop out the scrub so it stays dry, which will prolong the shelf life. Assuming you keep the scrub dry the only kind of spoilage we’re concerned about is the sea buckthorn seed oil going rancid, and that should take at least a year. With such a small batch you should use it all up well before then 🙂
To make your own powdered soap simply place some scraps of dried up soap in your coffee grinder with a small spoonful of clay (this helps lubricate things/dry them out so the soap doesn’t fuse together into a blob) and process until you no longer hear any big bits of soap bashing about—this will probably take a minute or two.
Makes about 4 tablespoons of scrub.
I love this. Prior to starting my handcrafted journey I purchased and still use a product by Fresh called Seaberry Skin Nutrition Booster. I love the way it makes my skin look. I add it to my nightly moisturizer. I always though they were one in the same but on closer research the product I use is from the meat (berry) of the plant whereas the kind you used is from the seed. Both have amazing benefits for the skin. Can’t wait for your book. You inspired me to begin lotion creating and has led me on my journey to fomulating my own. Thanks you!
Hey, Charity! That Seaberry Skin Nutrition Booster is such a neat idea, though perhaps indicative of the fact that many people moisturize with fairly nutrition-less moisturizers, which is sort of sad 😛 You could just make yourself a moisturizer with seabuckthorn and do away with the extra product if you wanted to 🙂 I have used the berry seed oil as well, but it is WAAAAY more orange than the seed oil, so it’s hard to use as it can drag your complexion into oompa-loompa territory pretty quicky 😛 Thanks so much for reading and DIYing with me!
I’ve been seeing sodium Laurel sulfoacetate sort of out the corner of my eye, while browsing websites lately. Wondered if it was a new product or if I never paid attention to the actual spelling of SLS.
I’m game to try new products that are low low on the danger danger scale.
Have fun! I am loving the suds-all-the-things benefits of surfactants 😀
I was wondering if you can substitute something else for the essential oils?
I have cats and I have read on numerous forums – both cat forums and essential oil forums – that you shouldn’t use essential oils around cats. Not even diffusing.
I’d really like to make my own soaps and cleansers, etc. – but most recipes I find include essential oils.
And I don’t know what -if anything- I can use in place of them.
Love your posts!
Jo
Well… you could use fragrance oils. But that doesn’t really seem like an improvement, safety-wise. Perhaps ask your vet instead of a forum? Otherwise, cocoa butter, coconut oil, and beeswax may be your core scents since they smell nice on their own 🙂
Thank you for sharing this wonderful recipe. I cant wait to try this.
Thanks for reading, Rita 🙂
“don’t get a crappy disposable one that’s basically just a cardboard version of a jock strap” LOL!!!
😀 It seemed like the perfect descriptor haha!
I am definitely going to try this recipe
Please do use SCI and SLSA in a shampoo bar recpie as LUSH has☺
That sounds like a fun play project—thanks!
Tried this with soap instead (my SLS is in the mail and I’m impatient) and I really like it! The soap lends some slipperiness but not so much foaming action but I love the way it felt on my skin! I feel so clean now! I also found out if you remove the charcoal you’ve got a darn good sink cleaner as well.
Yay! I’m so glad 🙂 With the charcoal it makes a good motivator to clean your skin haha 😛
This sounds lovely. Have you tried mixing with milk or yogurt in place of water?
I haven’t, since my tap doesn’t dispense either (:P), but you definitely could! I’d be interested to hear what you think if you try it 🙂
Hi Marie, I have a question for you, is it okay to substitute 1/4 teaspoon Sodium Lauryl Sulfoacetate for 1/4 teaspoon of TENSIOACTIF SODIUM COCO SULFATE?
Thank you!
I’m afraid I have no idea—I’ve never worked with it. I suppose it’s worth a try? Let me know if you give it a go.
Hi Mary,
I am wondering, is it safe to use SLS on the skin?
Maguy
Hey! I wrote an FAQ on this 🙂 (also, there’s no SLS in this recipe—SLSa is very different)
Hi Marie, and as usual thanks for all the experimenting! Quick question, would you have a rough idea of the percentage in weight of the surfactants vs the rest of the recipe? I have a big jar of ‘beauty grains’ for the face that I made with oats and powdered milk and spices and buttermilk powder and calendula petals and kaolin and quite frankly possibly something else I don’t remember and would very much like to add these surfactants, but have a hard time trying to calculate how much from tablespoons and teaspoons. Thanks!
Hey Patrizia! I’m sorry, I don’t. The upper usage rates for these surfactants are pretty high, though (50%+), so maybe just look up the upper recommended usage rate and work from there?
Thanks Marie. As a first try, I used your total of clays and charcoal and calendula and scooped out that same amount from my mixture, then added the surfactants as per your recipe. Not very foamy, actually hardly at all. Does your final product produce something that makes one think there is something similar to soap in there? Thanks!
Hmm, odd. With mine I can definitely work up some bubbles and it has a slip to it that is very characteristic of soap/surfactants when wet.
What, no funny face pic this time? Haha 😀
It’s pretty hard to snap one when I’m using my hands to wash my face 😛
Hi Marie! NDA has seabuckthorn seed oil 🙂 I mainly use it for colouring my soap orange though. Although i wonder if it’ll be good to use that in place of orange wax in your Citrus balm recipe..
Huzzah! That’s awesome 🙂 You probably could use it instead of orange wax, obviously it has a very different fatty acid composition, but it’s one that’s great for skin!
Hi Marie,
This is my favourite mask so far! I have made it several times but with lavender e/o and rose water. I love it! I love your book too (havent got the book plate yet tho in australia). Anyway, i love it and am working through everything in there. Well done girl!
Hey Kat! I’m so thrilled you’re loving this, and I love the addition or rose water (who wouldn’t, haha!). Thanks so much for reading and for buying my book—happy making! 🙂
DO you have the recipe in percentage?
I’m afraid I don’t, but you could calculate it yourself using this.
Adam enjoys this big time – made it with rose petals, mct oil and different eo’s! I love the dark color this whole dark aesthetics/ theme.. IMO my blend of orange, frankincense, myrhh and geranium is delightful. It’s surprising what good face scrub can do.
I should propably buy some rhassoul clay (in addition to common carrier oil with decent shelf life) lol…with that sandy texture and his likings in mind I used kaolin + ground pumice + hint of bentonite instead. I might convert this into grams next time and add some extra surfactants. xx