Soapnuts, Soapwort, Yucca: Skin Cleansers and All Natural/Eco-friendly Cleaning (Environmental Cleaning Information, All Natural Cosmetics)

Since I've recently discussed microfiber, I decided to blog about herbs that are be used to cleanse the skin, and also clean the house and laundry.


I've already blogged about soapwort (including a recipe), which is used in museums to clean ancient, delicate fabrics, is an awesome, very gentle skin cleanser, and can also be used to wash the hair.

So here are a couple of other great herbs and eco-friendly choices:

Soapnuts: I just got this herb recently. Apparently it can be used not only as a skin cleanser, but it has also become the environmental rage as a natural laundry detergent. I've only tried it as a facial cleanser (added a pinch to water, but may try a decoction in the near future) and will try to use it to clean my laundry (though I have the powder and not the whole nuts so not sure if that would make a mess or not. I think a decoction would be better rather than adding the nuts to my laundry as recommended by some web sites).

Yucca root: prepared similar to soapwort, but you have to crush the roots more before adding the water. But I do not believe the decoction has as long as a shelf life as soapwort decoction (only a few days, refrigerated). In the past, it was used to clean skin and hair by some Native American peoples. I am not sure about using it for the laundry but I may experiment with this. I've used this to wash my hair and it seems to do a pretty good job (but I love my soap based shampoos more).