Felted soap tutorial using antibacterial wool

Are you looking for a great felted gift idea? Some fun crafting ideas to do with the kids? Or perhaps a quick and easy felting project for yourself? Making felted soap bars check all those boxes. What is felted soap and what is it used for you might wonder. Felted soap is simply felting wool around a bar of soap. You then use the soap as normal and the wool around it creates a fantastic lather like a shower puff, making your soap last longer and giving you a more effective wash. Not only that, but felted soap bars look great, they add colour and fun to any gift or hand washing session. Unlike other felted soap tutorials, I use antibacterial wool for my felted soap. So, the question is not ‘why felted soap’ but ‘why not felted soap’!

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Table Of Contents

What is felted soap? and similar questions
Supplies needed to felt soap
Directions for felting a soap with corners
Felting a round bar of soap
Needle felting a bar of soap

What is felted soap? and similar questions

You may want to know is felted soap is hygienic, what is it used for and how to use it, does felted soap get mouldy, and why bother. Before diving into making them and giving them out as gifts. You are right to ask these questions, so here are the answers.

Why bother? Wool felted soap bars last longer than soap, is easier to grip than a slippery bar of soap, make a better lather, is exfoliating, is antimicrobial, is fun to wash with and looks great. It is an eco-friendly option. Wool is a natural material that eventually biodegrades so instead of filling up landfills with shower puffs that never break down, use this eco-friendly alternative instead.

What is felted soap used for? Felted soap bars can be used for washing your hands or your body in the bath or shower. Basically, anything you would use a regular bar of soap for.

How to use felted soap? Use just like a normal bar of soap. Get it wet rub it in your hands to form a lather then apply to the area you want to wash, scrub with it, then rinse the suds away. Eventually the soap will be used up and you will be left with a felted bag. You can use this as a scrubby in the shower, or for stuffing with cat nip as a toy for your cat.

Felted soap bars are sanitary? We all know that shower puffs and loofahs are not sanitary but thankfully the same rule doesn’t necessarily apply to wool, because raw wool has antimicrobial properties. The lanolin oil that naturally occurs in wool is antimicrobial and antibacterial. The less processed the wool is, the more lanolin it will contain. However, highly processed wool doesn’t have much lanolin. In this felted soap tutorial, I use wool dyed with curcumin (turmeric) to add antifungal and antimicrobial to the wool. Also keep in mind that the bacteria and microbes on soap (felted or not) come from you and there is no evidence of bacterial transfer from soap to your hands.

Does felted soap get mouldy? Felted wool is a highly breathable fabric, so as long as you don’t have the felted soap sitting in a pool of water it will dry out quickly. This will prevent mould, microorganisms and bacterial from growing in the wool. The best thing to do is have the soap sitting in a draining soap dish or shower caddy. You can also prevent yeast and mould fungus from growth by using wool dyed with curcumin (turmeric).

Using wool antibacterial wool

Wool naturally dyed using turmeric is not only easy to do, but the turmeric also gives the wool antibacterial properties which makes it perfect for felted soap making. To learn how to dye wool using turmeric, check out Dyeing wool with turmeric: a step by step guide (coming soon), you’ll learn all about natural dyeing, how to prepare and mordant the wool, as well as dyeing and curing it.

Wool roving naturally dyed bright yellow using turmeric powder

Felted soap bars using naturally dyed wool

Supplies needed to felt soap

Bar of soap

Wool (scroll down if you would like instructions on how to dye wool with turmeric)

Essential oils (optional)

Pantyhose or netting (gauze or tulle are recommended if you want to do other felting projects too)

Spray bottle

Bubble wrap (optional)

Towel (if felting indoors)

Sponge (to mop up spills)

Hand towel for drying your hands

Equipment you will need for felting; water, soap, towel, gauze and bubble wrap

Directions for felting a soap with corners

A fun felted soap is a great gift or craft to do with kids

Step 1. Round the corners

If the corners of the soap bar are sharp, use a vegetable peeler to round them out a bit so they don’t poke though the wool as they are felted. If the corners are already rounded you can skip this step.

Step 2. Lay the wool

Lay out a rectangle of wool, about 13 cm wide and 25 cm in height. You wool should be laid down in small shingles of wool that overlap one another and face the same direction (like shingles on a roof).

Lay the first layer of wool roving in overlapping shingles

Step 3. Add another layer of wool

Once you have one thin layer done, add another layer, with the shingles facing perpendicular to the first layer.

Lay a second layer of wool in shingles perpendicular to the first layer

Step 4. Wet the wool

Sprinkle on a lot of hot water, until all the wool is completely wet. Push out any trapped air in the wool with your fingers.

Wet the wool layer down using a spray bottle or ball sprinkler for felting

Step 5. Wrap the soap in wool

Lay the soap at the bottom of the rectangle. Fold the edge up around the soap and fold the side edges in. The roll the soap up to the top of the wool rectangle.

Step 6. Cover seams

You’ll notice that the wool creates a seam at the short sides. To cover this, lay a few shingles of wool on the top of the soap that over hang either end. Wet them down, and fold them under. Now the seams should be completely covered.

You may need to mop up water as you go, especially if you are working indoors.

To cover the seams from wrapping the wool, layer on more wool to cover them

Step 7. Add a design

If you want to add designs, I recommend using pre-felt to do so. Cut your pre-felt into shapes and add them to the top of the soap at this stage. Wet them down with hot water.

Cut a prefelt into the desired shape and add it to the top of the soap

Step 8. Felt the wool

Roll the soap up in the gauze or netting. Start rubbing the soap over the bubble wrap. Make sure to sub every side. Frequently alternate between dipping the soap into the bucket of cold water and hot water. The change in temperature will shock the wool and help with the felting process. You’ll want to do this for about 15 minutes. Then take a look at it. The fibers should be felting together.

Wrap the soap in gauze and scrub it over the bubble wrap to felt it

Step 9. Keep felting!

The wool should felt together enough that you can’t pull individual fibers off, and the pattern you added should also be well felted on. It may take 20 minutes to felt each bar of soap. Don’t worry if the wool looks a bit fuzzy when it dries, it will continue to felt as it gets used.

The soap is felted when the wool fibers hold together around the soap

If you would like to mass produce these felted soaps and cut down on the time and effort they take to make, consider using a tumble dryer to do the felting for you. To learn more about this process, visit How to Make Wet Felted Soaps Using a Tumble Dryer.

Felting a round bar of soap

Felting a round soap bar is easier because there are no corners. I like to add the wool to a round soap bar differently to the square or rectangular soap bar.

Step 1. Begin by adding a layer of roving ‘shingles’ in a circle. Wet down the roving, and place the bar of soap on top. Wrap the edges of the wool around the top of the soap.

To felt around a round bar of soap lay the wool in a circle

Step 2. You’ll notice that the wool layer on the bottom of the soap is quite thin and will need another layer. Repeat the process of laying out another layer of wool roving, then place the bar of soap in the wool again but upside down this time of the other side gets more wool. This will create an even layer around the bar and prevent holes from occurring as you felt the wool.

For this example, I used the antibacterial wool that was dyed using turmeric. I also added three strands of white roving to create a beach stone look to it, as if quartz veins were running through it.

Step 3 to 9 are the same steps as above.

Now that you’ve made your felted soap bars, you’re probably looking for ways to package them for gifts. Head over to ‘burlap + blue’ for some great ideas. Linda’s article, ‘how to package homemade soap’ has 13 amazing ways you can package your felted soap bar.

If you would like to make your own soap to felt, Tracy at ‘Oh the things we’ll make!’ has a great article and instructional video on how to do it. Her article, ‘Making an Easy, Basic Beginner Soap, and Then Making it Fun!!’, has all the information you need to make soap from scratch and it’s easy too!

Needle felting a bar of soap

Needle felted design on a wet felted bar of soap

Needle felting onto a felted soap bar can be done, however, I find it much more difficult than wet felting a design on. It is also more difficult than needle felting into a needle felting foam mat or cushion as the hard soap underneath the felted wool stops the needles from sinking in. This can make it tricky to felt.

If you do want to give it a try, I recommend making the felted wool layer around the soap quite thick and then needle felting your pattern on with the needle at an angle to the wool rather than straight down. This help the barbed part of the needle to sink deep enough into the wool to interlock the fibers.

Please note that needle felting is not kid-friendly, the needles are barbed and very sharp. If you would like to try this activity with kids, use the wet felting or machine felting process only.