Every August, Gloucester hosts the Waterfront Festival in a beautiful spot overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. (So excited because we’re going out on the Ardelle, the schooner in the photo, this afternoon!).
I look forward to the festival because it gives me a chance to restock my favorite bath, body and skincare products from Nature Island Botanicals, all handmade from natural, organic and fair trade ingredients.
My favorite NIB products are body lotions and body butters in Caribbean Escape, a coconut/pina colada scent, and in Citrus Sunrise, a fabulous orange scent. Both scents are truly heaven! They are my absolute favorite body products bar none. They’re made with natural oils, and they hydrate my super dry skin sooooooo well. The body butter comes in a jar and has a mousse-like consistency, but it is very hydrating. The body lotion comes in a pump bottle, but it is just as hydrating as the body butter. I love ’em both! Since I still had some Caribbean Escape body butter left, I bought Citrus Sunrise Body Lotion this time.
I also love the vegan, cold process bar soaps. This year, I came home with three of them. Although Daphne Frampton, the owner and artisan, does make some of the specific soap combos year after year, she also changes things up. A few months ago on Facebook, I saw her newest creation, Ocean, a marbleized blue and white soap with white sea shells on the top, made with ginger and bamboo oils. Mine has a little scallop shell on top. Ocean has a lovely fresh, beachy scent with a hint of ginger. I hate to use it because it’s so pretty to look at!
The next soap I fell in love with was because of the scent combination: chocolate and raspberry. It reminds me of Queen of Cakes, the three layer dark chocolate cake with raspberry jam filling that Jeff used to make for his daughter Marah’s birthdays. I wish you could smell this hot pink and chocolate colored soap, you’d want to eat it!
The third soap is Vetiver, a lemony-herbal scent. The soap is marbleized butter yellow, pale green and purple. It’s made with olive, coconut, castor, and sunflower oils as well as fair trade cocoa and shea butters. It’s a gender-neutral scent and pattern. It makes me think of an old friend, Jeannie, who introduced me to vetiver years ago in New York.
I wish I could’ve bought more. Daphne had a new honey facial cleanser in a clear glass mason jar that looked just like honey and smelled so appealing, but I just couldn’t buy everything. Her face/neck cream smelled and looked great too. She’ll be back at the end of October at the Clam Chowder Festival in Essex MA, so maybe then.
Daphne sells Nature Island Botanicals products at craft fairs and festivals on Long Island NY, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Maryland every weekend from April through December. Frankly, I don’t know how she does it – crafting products during the week, traveling and working all day outdoors on the weekends. Her studio is outside of Providence RI. You can also purchase her products through her etsy shop or by phone at 954-646-4005. The soaps are $10 each (I cut them in half coz they’re big), and I believe the body butters and lotions are priced around $25.
Are you a fan of handmade bath, body and skincare products? Would you try something like this?
Wow Allison! Everything looks and sounds so inviting. 🙂
I’ve been buying Daphne’s handmade soaps, lotions, body butters for about 12 years. I really like ’em, Laura! I always have to have some of the Caribbean Escape body butter on hand, and now the Citrus Sunrise body lotion is becoming another must have. They’re a nice treat. Have a good LDW, Laura!
Wow, these look and sound absolutely stunning! I really need to try this gorgeous handmade line!
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Thank you, Helen xoxo Have a good LDW!!
I love handmade soaps and the festival sounds fun. Take me with you next time!
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Please come next August, Cindy! Gloucester is beautiful and the festival is fun!
I adore handmade soaps and bought a tonne of them in France last year. Handmade soaps have a more wholesome feel to them and I even prefer them to shower gels. These look lovely – especially Ocean. And you cannot go wrong with a chocolate-raspberry soap!
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My feelings exactly! I would love to go back to France to stock up on soaps and everything else!
I really like the sounds of Vetiver. This whole post makes me want to go to the beach lol
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Vetiver is a cool, somewhat masculine but also gender-neutral scent. I love it for body products and candles especially.
Chocolate soap, you say?! I would buy it just cos it’s so gorgeous but chocolate in it too? SOLD!
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The Chocolate Raspberry soap smells so yummy!!
This brand sounds so great! I definitely want chocolate raspberry soap.
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Chocolate and raspberry just go so well together even in soap!
Chocolate and Raspberry sounds delicious. You know, even though I don’t like citrusy fragrances, I do like citrusy soaps.I need to check out these I love a good handmade soap.
None of the soaps I got are citrusy: one is vetiver, one is chocolate and raspberry, and the third is an ocean scent! She makes all types of soaps: lavender, mint and probably about 10 others 🙂 The body lotion is Citrus Sunrise, and she also has Caribbean Escape (sort of a pina colada) and White Ginger. So far everything I’ve tried smells incredible