From crocheting to mosaics, Tracy Conklin loves to dabble in crafts.
But her favorite craft of them all is soap-making.
Conklin owns Artemesia Soaps, Salts, & Scrubs, which sells handmade soap, lotion, face masks and other skincare items. Conklin, who has lived in Tucson since 1984, has a brick and mortar shop on Tucson’s east side and also sells her products online.
Conklin’s soap journey started around 2002 or 2003 with glycerin soap, but she switched to making cold process soaps instead. Cold process gives makers more creativity, Conklin explained.
“With cold process, it’s all raw ingredients so you build it,” she says. “Once I did soap, it was like, ‘Oh my gosh!’ and I’ve been doing it ever since.”
Most of Tracy Conklin’s products are all-natural, with the exception of items that have an added fragrance oil.
Conklin started selling her products around 2005 — “out of self defense,” she says.
“My husband was like, ‘This is an expensive hobby,’ so I started selling so I could keep soaping,” she says.
After years of selling products online and at a handful of art shows every year, Conklin opened her brick and mortar four years ago.
Conklin mainly learned how to make soap from reading books and teaching herself, but she also took a handful of classes on soap, lotion and fragrance blending.
She shares that creative process with customers through “create and take,” in which community members can book an appointment to make products of their own at Conklin’s shop, located on East Tanque Verde Road near North Kolb Road.
Most of Conklin’s products are all-natural, with the exception of items that have an added fragrance oil. But in that case, the oil makes up less than 1% of the entire recipe, Conklin says. Some scents are influenced by the desert — including ingredients such as creosote and desert sage. Among the many soap scents available, the most popular are saguaro blossom, desert rain and blue agave.
And Conklin is the sole person behind the craft. She says she can make one loaf of soap — which then creates 44 bars — in about 40 minutes.
“It’s like my little zen place or meditation,” she says. “When I get into the zone, it’s nice. I like to think I’m infusing (my products) with positive energy because I never soap when I’m mad or something’s going on.
“Usually when I’m doing my stuff, it’s with joy.”
Customers at Artemesia Soaps, Salts, & Scrubs will find everything from lotion to soap to face masks.
Artemesia Soaps, Salts, & Scrubs
