Although I used to lather it all over me, for the last thirty years or so I've only used soap on my hands. I wash my face (and other parts) thoroughly in hot water only. I think hot water is quite sufficient, and it cannot damage the skin by, for instance, drying it out or reacting with it. The proof is that I have - for all that time - remained free of any sort of washing-induced skin irritation.
On the whole, I think my skin (facial or elsewhere) is in a better state than might be expected for a woman of my vintage. I mainly put that down to careful washing in hot water only - although a lifelong aversion to suntanning, and (no doubt) the effect of taking HRT for the last eleven years, must also have something to do with it.
Anyway, back to Wright's Coal Tar Soap.
I was listening to LBC on the radio the other evening, and it was Iain Dale's show, and he was discussing the spread of coronavirus, and things we can do to remain properly and defensively hygienic. An expert doctor was explaining his views on proper handwashing, and threw in that at home he was a great fan of Wright's Coal Tar Soap.
I pricked up my ears at this. Aha. That sounded like a great idea. I'd try that out. I remembered what Wright's Coal Tar Soap looked like, and how it smelled. Whatever its actual properties, it exuded health and hygiene, and I had always liked the aroma. In any case, it was soap, and as such would dissolve grease and wash it off the hands, and with it any nasty things you didn't want that had clung to the grease. I decided to give it a go.
In fact, with possible soap shortages in mind, I went the whole hog, and bought bars for not only my bathroom, but my kitchen and caravan too. Together with translucent plastic soap dishes that snapped shut for travel. (Ironically, I noticed that these plastic soap dishes had been made in China, where the initial coronavirus outbreak had occurred...)
Hmm. That was odd. No mention of coal tar on the packaging. They just called it 'Traditional Soap'.
I looked it up on Wikipedia. (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright%27s_Coal_Tar_Soap) Ah, they'd had to abandon the use of coal tar some time back, and substitute something else. An EU directive. That substitute was Tea Tree oil. And they had adjusted the smell of the soap to how it always used to be. Well that was OK. Tea Tree oil ought to be fine. Wikipedia added that the soap was now made in Turkey. That seemed an odd place, but then why not? It didn't have to be made in the dingy alleyways of Southwark. Although I wondered what might happen if UK-Turkish relations ever hit the rocks. Maybe Wright's Coal Tar Soap would need to be smuggled out of Turkey, becoming a hot cargo worth millions on the streets of Britain's towns and cities.
Till then it was a cheap buy. In fact I paid just 85p for each of my three bars of soap, and this was at Boots, never the least inexpensive place to get anything (but I'm building up my Advantage Card points).
It struck me that switching to a bar of soap in the quest for better, doctor-recommended hand-hygiene would save me money. Hitherto I'd been using this kind of thing, at not less than twice the price:
And that kind of liquid soap came in a plastic bottle, complicated to make (with its spring-loaded pump and nozzle), and not easily or fully recyclable. I dare say that much of its cost was the throw-away pump mechanism (somebody, somewhere, would be getting a tiny royalty for its use). If I gave up buying soap in pump-dispensers, it would definitely help the planet.
My bars of Wright's Traditional Soap were very simply wrapped in just one layer of paper. Much greener!
Unwrapped, I could smell the soap straight away. A really nice clean smell. Even if it didn't boast the original formulation, and there was no coal tar, it retained the look, feel and aroma I fondly remembered.
On one side, WRIGHT'S. On the other, a Latin motto: PERSEVERANDO VINCES. Which means 'You succeed by persisting'. Absolutely right. I wonder if, back in 1860, when Wright's Coal Tar Soap first hit the shops, there had been other messages to read, presumably also in Latin. A whole sting of them, exhorting the user to self-improvement. Which, if so, would suggest that the marketing was aimed at middle-class parents and their governesses rather than semi-illiterate slum-dwellers. Indeed, could anybody in 1860, who lived eight to a room, afford to buy soap? Which is why they were the Great Unwashed, although it was hardly their own fault. Food and shelter came first. This was when Dickens was still railing against entrenched social deprivation and injustice in his novels. And Mayhew had published his encyclopedic and prolix analysis of slum life, London Labour and the London Poor, only nine years before.
Still, by the end of the nineteenth century Wright's Coal Tar Soap must have become a national favourite. But in 2020? Well, I have to say it wasn't on sale in Waitrose, which surprised me, but it was on sale in Boots next door. I know where to get further supplies!
Two days in, I'm enjoying the very-retro soap bar experience. The wasteful and expensive pump-action handwashes have been swept aside. I'm back to the old-fashioned way. So you'll now find this in the bathroom and kitchen (although if you prefer, I'll get out the pump-action soaps if you're visiting me):
And actually, I'm giving my hands a better, more thorough wash. Grasping the bar smears soap all over one's palms, and to remove that requires a longer and more effective washing of both hands, all parts of them, front and back. It's hard not to take 20 seconds over it. Which is what proper hand washing needs to be. If done under running water, I reckon there will be a little more to pay on my household water bill, but I think it's worth it.
The only fly in the ointment may be that a prolonged exposure to proper soap may induce eczema, to which my hands are occasionally subject. I get a mild bout most months - or used to. But so far, so good.
