Here at Alchemy of Sol, shea butter is one of the base ingredients that we use for all of our soaps. But what makes it “natural”? It’s the extraction process.

Originally used as a sunblock and cooking oil in West Africa, Shea Butter has various uses from holding hairstyles in place to soothing and improving eczema. This oily substance is extracted out of the nut from the Shea Nut Tree, also known as Karite Nut Tree.

After extraction, shea butter can be combined with other organic and natural ingredients to create hair and skin products without the risk of drying or stripping the skin of natural oils.

Shea butter naturally encourages collagen production which can help reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. It can also act as an anti-inflammatory due to it’s high volume of cinnamic acid when combined with essential oils and other products to act as a base.

In the traditional method, the shea nut is dried and ground into a powdery substance. Afterwards, the powder is mixed with water and then boiled to bring what we know as the “butter” to the surface of the water.

Unfortunately, most distributors use harsh chemicals such as hexane during the extraction process. Hexane is a petroleum based resource and is toxic not only to humans and animals, but also to the environment as it is recognized to be a hazardous air pollutant (HAP) by the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

What goes onto our skin is just as important to what goes into our body. From start to finish, we honor the ingredients and strive to preserve the quality of each of our products for your nourishment, health and beauty.

With respect to the environment, we lovingly handcraft every one of our soaps from the finest African Shea Nut Trees. Our natural cold processes bring out the richest quality shea butter which is the foundation of all of our all natural, vegan shea butter soaps.