Mystic Water Soap Brings Suds to Kensington Farmers Market

Michelle Burns has been making soap using only raw materials for more than 20 years.

“I don’t use any pre-make basis,” she said. 

She creates soaps that look different. For example, her popular soap, sea salt soap is blue and white like the blue ocean and white sand. 

“I try to make them look like they smell,” she said. 

One time a customer forgot the name of the soap that she liked, but she could describe its colors.  Immediately, Burns knew which soap she wanted to buy.

Burns said that each one of her soaps incorporate her criteria that make a good soap:  (1) the ability to form a good lather; (2) to be gentle, (3) to last a long time, (4) to smell nice, and (5) to be pretty.

Mary Stancill, a regular customer, explained the popularity of sea salt soap.

“It has this effervescence to it.  If you’re stressed, it releases you," she said. "If you’re fried, it wakes you up.” 

Stancill said she likes to use a loofah cloth to rub the sea salt on her skin.

Burns’ facial soaps, however, do not contain any artificial fragrances or colors.  The colors reflect the ingredients.  Her soaps cost between $5 and $7.

Burns recommends for your soap to have longevity to make sure it has air. 

“You don’t want to leave soap in a puddle of water,” she said.  “Soap dishes should allow the water to drain."

Burns sells natural abalone sea shells that one can fill with glass beads from an art store, or hand carved soap dishes made by a woman’s cooperative in India.

Burns’ shampoo bar consists of Moroccan Argan oil, lavender, orange, rosemary, ylang ylang, castor oil, olive oil, shea butter, and coconut oil.  For detangling hair, she sells conditioning oil and detangling combs.

For the past three years, Burns has been creating a shaving soap.  She sells both soap and brushes for men.  She even provides a stick form for women to shave their legs.  Burns’ website for shaving soap is www.mystic4men.com.

Burns offers lip balms that she created from her own recipe. They cost $3 a piece or four for $10.

For our infamous summers, Burns has created neck coolers.  All one does is soak the neck cooler in cold water and put it across the neck.  They are great for cooling off in the heat while gardening, jogging, playing golf, or roasting underneath the sun. They cost $9.75 a piece.

Burns sells soap nuts from India to wash clothes, which she said they also use to wash their hair. She suggested adding her lavender sachets in the dryer to add scent to your clothes. She said that you can re-use them up to 10 times in the dryer. Or one can use the lavender sachets to add to scent to your linen.

To add scent to a room, Burns offers essential oils.  She uses them to make soap, but they are popular in aromatherapy.

Burns also sells dusting powder, both scented and unscented.

Some of the other items that Burns offers are bath salts, facial masks, henna, shea butter from Ghana, and mystic water soap samples on a rope.

Burns is usually at the Kensington Farmers’ Market on Saturdays between 8 a.m. and noon.  You can check her website, www.mysticwatersoap.com, to learn more about her products and her other appearances.