Jane in January – A New Persuasion Soap!

Happy New Year! It’s hard to believe it’s already 2015! What better way to start the new year than with Jane Austen! During the month of January, we are having a ‘Jane in January’ event, focusing primarily on “Pride and Prejudice,” with a few exceptions, one of which is today’s post!

Readers’ Choice Soap Contest in Honor of Persuasion and Jane in January!

Regency Cameo Design

Did you know that thanks to the creativity of Evie Cotton – Jane Austen fan, devoted Austen Variations reader, and soap maker extraordinaire – Theo Darcy from the Austen Variations original story, The Darcy Brothers, has his own soap, as do various other characters from Pride and Prejudice? Her original bar soaps include Lizzy’s Lavender, Mr. Collins’ Exuberance, Anne de Bourgh’s Detoxification, Lucky Lydia, and Mrs. Bennet’s Nerves.

Lizzy’s Lavender

Recently she asked herself why not characters from Persuasion, too? To kick off her line of Persuasion soaps, she’s asking you – our Austen Variations’ readers – to help her out by voting on which character her first Persuasion soap will represent, as well as the various characteristics of the soap. Thanks to her generosity, at the end of the month, two bars of this unique soap will be given away as part of the Jane in January special giveaways.

Here are the various options you’ll be able to vote on:

Jan 8th – Character from Persuasion

Jan 13th – Type of soap

Jan 15th – Shape or design

Jan 20th – Scent

Jan 27th – Color

Jan 29^th – Additives

The winner of the soaps will be announced Sunday, February 1st.

Here’s more from Evie about her business…

Evie Measuring Ingredients

My store name/ Business name, Shirley’s Handicrafts, doesn’t sound like it has much to do with me, but in fact, it does. My grandmother, Shirley Fae High (formerly Stoneceipher) was a avid genealogist. I spent many happy afternoons as a child sitting at the dining room table, listening to stories of our past as she showed me charts of our ancestry and maps of England. My Grandma High can definitely take the credit for instilling a love of history and research in me, as well as giving me an intense curiosity and imagination. My family is very important to me, and we are all very creative, artistic people. When deciding to start a business, I wanted it to be open to my entire family, an umbrella of sorts, which would cover any of us in whichever form of art we choose. Shirley, the mother of us all became the symbol of our familial bond, thus began Shirley’s Handicrafts.

Theo Darcy’s Soap

My chosen art form is pretty obvious, soap. I love creating new combinations of color, scent and design. The more I create and practice my art form, the better my products become and the more ideas I have. Reading, history, geography and the authors of Austen Variations are a huge part of my life as well. My love of creating soaps and my connection to all things Jane Austen melds perfectly in my line of Jane Austen Inspired Soaps. In 2014, I partnered with Austen Variations to design a soap dedicated to Theo Darcy, a character from their original work, The Darcy Brothers. I went on to create a complete line of Pride and Prejudice Inspired Soaps, dedicating a unique bar of soap to all of the major characters from the novel. In November, I began a new line of soaps inspired by the authors of Jane Austen Fan Fiction and their novels. I will continue that line of soaps throughout 2015 and begin a new line of soaps inspired by Jane Austen’s Persuasion. This new line will begin with the first Reader’s Choice Soap Contest!

Jane’s Rose Bar

You can check out my website or visit my Etsy page for more information! And if anyone has questions or would like to discuss creating a special soap just for them, they can email me at shirleyshandicrafts@gmail.com