Two tablespoons of soap to a cup of water, then an acidic rinse to rebalance pH. Skipping the rinse is why most people give up on castile soap shampoo.
More people abandon castile soap as shampoo than any other use, and almost always for the same reason: they do the first half of the recipe and skip the second.
Shampoo: Wet hair. Mix 2 tbsp soap with 1 cup purified water. Lather from scalp to ends, rinse thoroughly. Follow with an acidic rinse to balance pH: 1 part lemon juice or apple cider vinegar to 8 parts purified water. Keep away from eyes.
Soap is alkaline. Hair and scalp sit on the acidic side. Washing with any true soap raises the pH at the hair surface, which lifts the cuticle, the overlapping outer layer of each strand. Lifted cuticles catch on each other, and that is the waxy, tangled, straw-like feeling people describe after their first attempt.
The acidic rinse brings the pH back down and lays the cuticle flat again. One part lemon juice or apple cider vinegar to eight parts purified water, poured through after rinsing out the soap. Hair that felt like straw before the rinse feels normal after it.
This is not a quirk of our soap. It is true of every genuine soap-based shampoo, and it is the single fact that decides whether this works for you.
Two tablespoons of soap to one cup of purified water is the starting point. Fine hair usually wants it weaker; thick or long hair can take it as written. Mix a batch that lasts a week or two rather than diluting a lot at once, and use a diluted mixture within two to three weeks.
Wet your hair thoroughly first. Pour the mixture at the scalp, work it through with your fingers rather than piling hair on top of your head, and rinse until the water runs clear. The lather is creamy and dense rather than airy, since there are no synthetic foam boosters in this soap.
If your water is hard, soap plus minerals leaves a residue that no amount of rinsing removes. Purified water in the mix helps. So does the acidic rinse, which dissolves some of that residue as it goes.
Hair that has been on detergent shampoo for years often takes several washes to settle. Judge it after three or four, not after one, and do the acidic rinse every time.
Keep soap and rinse away from your eyes.
Yohan & Alex
Co-founders, Whole Naturals
For external use only. Keep out of reach of children. Discontinue use if irritation, redness or discomfort occurs.
