I make soap and I recently started making shaving soap also. I came across a sample of Lime essential oil and I thought that it would go good in a shaving soap but also perhaps mixed with something else. Anybody have any favorites in this direction?
A currently popular combination in perfumery is oud (agarwood), but that may be cost-prohibitive and/or inappropriate for saponification; it may be that other woody scents, like cedar or sandalwood, blend well. As a "fresh" scent, lime also mixes well with several floral or minty notes. To my sensibilities, lime doesn't mix well with "spicy" notes.
You can always mix citrus with mint. You might want to try both spearmint & peppermint, to see which combo works better.
Thanks for the numerous replies. It seems the combination is Minty-Fruty...in this direction. Also the coconut is there. I really want to find a coconut scent that is not synthetic but I have not been successful in this. I like to keep things on the "Natural" side with the Soaps. However it Looks like I will have to make an exception in the case of coconut.
AFAIK, there's no such thing as a coconut EO. What's out there is all FO... some *smell* more natural than others tho.
I believe most of us considered "menthol" and "mint/minty" to reference a similar scent when framing our replies.
I have cedar oil...almost a whole Kilogram of it. I was asked to make an anti-moth Soap that can be set in the closet and such. Na ja. It does not produce the cedar scent that one associates with the Wood itself. Also, it is, ion my opinion, quite weak. However Cedarwood oil does have one Thing going fot it that is similar to Sandelwood. Both of those Essential oils do not contain any components that are on the Allergen list.
Ogallala Bay Rum sells a Bay Rum Limes and Peppercorns that I love. In fact, it's the only Bay Rum scent that my wife will let me wear.
Lime and "spice" goes well together, I'm thinking along the lines of Royall Lyme (I have no idea what the "spice" is), or something along the line of Lime Old Spice (I had inherited the remnants of a bottle when my great uncle died in the 1980's that didn't survive that decate, but it sure smelled good!).
I really like the Crabtree & Evelyn West Indian Lime scent. From what I've read, it's primarily lime and vetiver.
Update on the Lime: I made a my first Batch of lime Soap yesterday. Not shaving Soap though. I am waiting for more stearic acid that is on the way. The lime scent did hold up well to the saponification reaction and it did not turn out too bad for the first attempt with a new essential oil. I Need to lower the start temperature a bit...heat pitting visible in places I just noticed something when I looked at the Picture online here...green soap does not really take a good picture on a grey background.
