It takes fourteen days to produce real Marseilles soap.
The Marseilles process or “full fire” heating :
A vat contains 30 tons of soap
Stage 1• Saponification or paste producing
The vegetable oils and soda wash
are mixed together in a large vat which can contain 20 tons of raw materials.
Under the action of soda and heat, the oils gradually become soap paste.
This chemical reaction is the saponification or paste production.
Stage 2 • Rinsing or cleansing
The soap paste is rinsed several times with salt water to remove the remaining soda.
Stage 3 • Heating process
The paste is heated at 100 °C for ten days.
Heating starts up every morning and is turned off every night.
Stage 4 • Liquifying
The paste is then rinsed several times with fresh water, to remove all impurities,
thus earning the name “extra pure”.
Being more liquid, the paste is then allowed to settle during 2 days.
These different stages are known as “cooking up”.
This delicate stage requires all the attention and know-how of the soap masters.
Stage 5 • Pouring off the heated soap paste
While still hot (between 50 and 70 °C), the soap paste is poured into
the huge cooling tanks, by means of an articulated wooden feed pipe, called “goulotte”.
The “moulds” : pouring off, drying out and cutting up
Stage 6 • Drying out
The soap is left to dry for 48 hours in a room. When the Mistral wind blows,
the windows facing North are opened and the wind shortens the drying-out process.
Stage 7 • Cutting up
Once dry, the soap is cut, in the moulds, into 35 kilo blocks by a wheel-operated blade.
These blocks are then cut up in a machine producing 2.5 kilos, I kilo, 600g, 500g and 400g blocks.
Stage 8 • Drying out on wooden shelves
The blocks of soap are laid out on wooden shelves to dry.
After 48 hours in a drying oven, a crust forms on the surface, they can now be stamped.
Stage 9 • Moulding
There are two ways of stamping : hand-stamping on bars or in a machine mould for cubes.
Cubes are stamped on all six sides, the traditional sign of “Marseilles soap”.
The hand-stamped bars dry out on wooden shelving
For soap tablets, the raw materials are the same
but production methods differ slightly; the tablets are produced from flakes
of Marseilles soap to which perfume and shea butter are added.
Knowledge of the ingredients and different stages is not enough;
only the secret know-how passed down through generations can guarantee successful soap making.
Despite specific production methods, Marseilles soap has not been
granted an “Appellation Contrôlée” label, thus permitting misuse of the term.
