How did you get here?

“Mary, you should get a hobby.”—P.Swan, May 2020.

If only he knew then what he knows now!

Hi there! I’m glad you found my website and discovered the beauty of homemade bar soap! My name is Mary Swan and I am the owner, founder and creator of Swan Soap Company. That’s right, with a last name of Swan, naming a soap company couldn’t have been easier! My husband and I live in St. Louis, MO with our two young daughters and highly energetic sheepadoodle dog (he thinks he is a human, too)! While furloughed from healthcare in 2020, I enjoyed my new role as a stay at home mom while I dabbled in a few hobbies. In order to stay busy while furloughed I tackled all the items on my to do list! I taught myself how to sew using a sewing machine, completed a few DIY projects that were collecting dust and reorganized about all that I could at that time! But that only took a few weeks. That’s when my husband suggested I get a hobby. That may have backfired a bit as I didn’t just get a hobby. I found a passion!

That’s when I decided to try something that scared me. I wanted to make homemade “lye” soap from scratch. You know the kind your grandparents made in the backyard in the stainless steel pots and told you to always stay away while they were making it because it was very dangerous and stinky! Do you remember it? That soap was the absolute BEST STAIN FIGHTER! Hands down, no competition! Grease, blood, spaghetti sauce, some paint stains, set in stains, grass stains, set in chocolate. You name it, I have removed it with that soap, warm water and a little bit of elbow grease! It was also a fabulous bar to wash your face with, as long as you moisturized after! But I digress. My grandma and her German siblings could not have been the only ones “stirring” up trouble with their sodium hydroxide “lye”, right? Well, we lost my Grandma about a decade ago and because this is how the circle of life happens, many of her siblings have gone to rest along with her. So after searching the internet for the recipe that I thought would best replicate Grandma’s multipurpose “lye” soap, we decided to give it a good ole’ college try!

After we put the girls to bed and the dog in another room, we, my husband and I, suited up for our first soap making experience. There was definitely a learning curve for both of us. It got messy and stinky! But we had a great time! We loved the way the old fashioned soap turned out. So I branched out and learned new methods of soap making. I had no idea there were so many different ways to make soap! After much trial and error, I determined that my preferred method is Cold Process.

After watching what feels like all the videos on the internet and reading all of the books and blogs, it was time to start creating! I continue to learn valuable lessons from my imperfect batches and my family and friends certainly enjoy my rejects! But after just a couple of batches in the beginning , I felt ready to share my luxurious handmade soaps with the world. Well, at least the St. Louis Metro area! The way my bars will leave your skin feeling after washing with them is unlike that of a body wash or bar soap from the grocery store shelf. The bonus is that you are not having to dispose of that bulky plastic container when it’s empty. You will also be supporting a local small business rather than a big box company.

Our family has switched to bar soap and with so many varieties, it’s time your family tries Swan Soap Company bar soap too! We hope that you enjoy using our handcrafted soaps as much as we enjoyed making them.

We are happy that you visited our site and we hope to provide you with soap (and beauty products) handmade with all the Swan love!

If you made it this far, congratulations! Please feel free to message us at info@swansoapco.com with any questions or suggestions for new soaps or bath and body products! We are constantly testing and adding new products. I am currently working on lotions and scrubs while testing a couple of shampoo and conditioner bar recipes. More to come on that very soon!