“I believe that Marrakech ought to be earned as a destination. The journey is the preparation for the experience. Reaching it too fast derides it, makes it a little less easy to understand.”

― Tahir Shah, In Arabian Nights

I managed to wrest a very good lather out of this soap, although I found I needed to do a fair amount of fiddling with the water content to keep it where I liked it, as some of the water evaporated off between passes. I think one aspect that tends to get overlooked when making lather is just good old elbow-grease; put a bit more work into actually working your lather and the results do improve, just don’t be lazy! Anyways, a good shave, with good enough glide (assuming you keep the water content high enough!) and nice and thick.

I’ll note here that I’ve decided to slightly tweak my scoring system when it comes to the lather quality; I’ve been giving out too many 9/10s, and there’s sufficient range within that group to justify two rankings. So now, the “high 9s” will be staying 9s, the “low 9s” will be bumped down to 8s, and everything below it will drop a score too. I’ll be going and adjusting the scores on previously submitted soaps as well.

The aroma today was, well, rather underwhelming. Mystic Water touts it as “dark iron-distilled East Indian patchouli, Virginia cedarwood, cinnamon leaf, oak moss, lime and petigrain essential oils” which seems accurate enough. It’s earthy and woodsy, and reasonably pleasant. Just not strong enough; when you first lather it up and slap it on your face, you only get just a hint of the scent, and even that mostly fades away as you shave.

8/10 Scent Pleasantness

6/10 Scent Strength

8/10 Lather Quality

So, overall I’m going to give it a 7/10. There’s nothing bad about it per se, but nothing stands out.

Gear used:

Ingredients: Tallow, Water, Castor Seed Oil, Glycerin, Potassium Hydroxide, Shea Butter, Avocado Oil, Palm Oil, Sodium Hydroxide, Patchouli EO, Stearic Acid, Cedarwood EO, Lime EO, Fragrance, Aloe Vera Leaf Juice, Bentonite, Cinnamon Leaf EO, Silk.