Best Soap Molds For Beginners: TDHDIKE Silicone Soap Molds
Let’s talks soap making! And the best soap molds for beginners.
When a reader asked us to write about the best soap molds for DIY crafters, we started researching the soap-making world . . . and quickly went down the rabbit hole of Instagram soap hashtags. Wow! The creativity out there among soap enthusiasts is amazing.
Our readers who love making soap for gifts and other special occasions (think baby showers) pointed out to us that there are four basic kinds of soap making: melt-and-pour, cold process, hot process and milling.
While the details of these processes is beyond the goal of this article, we learned that a good basic silicone soap mold is a great place for beginners to start. For those folks, we’d recommend this three-pack of silicone soap molds.
Nothing fancy—these molds just get the job done! We tried out several different basic molds before deciding this pack had the best quality . . . and best bang for the buck.
Here’s more:
What We Liked
• Easy to clean!
• Refrigerator and freezer safe.
• Easy to unmold.
• Dishwasher safe.
• Oven and microwave oven safe.
• Affordable.
• Best if placed on a baking or cookie sheet for stability. We learned that tip from one of our readers who had one too many mishaps when her molds distorted the soap . . . especially when the molds are moved around.
• Popular size: each mold makes six 3.5 ounce bars.
What Needs Work
• Thinner than other, more fancy molds. But we think that is a feature, not a bug as that helps beginners!
• Not so great for botanicals. Many DIY soap fans love to use botanicals (flowers, herbs, etc) in their soap recipes. These molds are only so-so for that use. If you are looking for a mold that works best with botanicals, we’d suggest our next recommendation.
Best Soap Molds For Botanicals: Silicone Soap Molds
If you go down the rabbit hole of do-it-yourself soap making hashtags, you’ll quickly see amazing creations like this:
Yes, those are dried flowers (lavender) on top—just beautiful!
Soap like this is made with a soap mold kit that includes a mold, wood box and special blades to cut the soap.
After researching several kits and surveying our readers for their favorites, we thought the best bet is ZYTJ’s Silicone Soap Molds Kit. Affordable, yet well made, this kit is perfect for more advanced DIY soap makers who want to give botanicals a try.
Here’s more:
What We Liked
• Cutting tools are excellent.
• Easy release.
• Easy to clean.
• Thick liner.
• Affordable.
• Two cutters: smooth and grooved.
• 42 ounce capacity can make about 8 bars at once—impressive!
What Needs Work
• Hard to get the soap out of the mold? While we thought the mold was easy to release, a few dissenters had issues getting their soap to release from the sides of the mold. Good news: there are quite a few tips and tricks you can use to prevent that from happening—check out any DIY soap community for advice.
Best Melt-and-Pour Soap Molds: Silicone Soap Molds, AIDOIT
As we mentioned at the start of this article, there are several different ways to make your own soap. Among the easiest methods for kids (or beginners) is the melt-and-pour route—you start with a simple soap base, melt it and then pour it in a mold. Simple! (And no messing with lye or other chemicals).
For the best melt-and-pour molds, we’d recommend these silicone flower soap molds. As the name implies, these beautiful flower molds make great flower-shaped soap—very pretty!
What We Liked
• Easy to clean.
• Well-defined shapes,
• Great for glycerine soaps.
• Food grade silicone.
• Safe for ovens, dishwashers, freezers, refrigerators, and microwaves.
• Also great for cakes and muffins—we love the shapes for our cinnamon sugar muffins, a local favorite here at the ranch.
What Needs Work
• Not the best choice for soap with botanicals. That soap works better with the kit recommended earlier in this article.
• Not as ideal for cold process soaps. For soap makers who prefer to make soap from scratch (so they can control the process more minutely), we’d suggest our next recommendation.
Best Cold Process Soap Molds: Silly Pops Rectangle Silicone Soap Molds
Warning: making your own soap can be addictive.
Sure, you start with a few simple melt-and-pour molds and online tutorials . . . and then you quickly have your friends fawning over your creations.
As you go down the DIY soap rabbit hole, you’ll be tempted to try out cold process soap making. We won’t go into the details on how that works (it involves chemicals like lye and some serious safety precautions), but we will recommend a mold for cold-process soap aficionados: Silly Pops rectangle silicone soap molds.
We loved the intricate designs—perfect if you want to take your soap making creativity to another level.
Here’s more:
What We Liked
• Delicate detailing with hearts, butterflies and more.
• Easy to release.
• Easy to clean.
• Food grade silicone.
What Needs Work
• Pricey.
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