2521 – Soap Mother Shipton

Physical description:

Large bar of golden-brown coloured soap, featuring a moulded picture of Mother Shipton (wearing a witch's pointy hat and a ruff) on one side, and the maker's name, Goodwin, on the other.

Museum classification:

Images of Witchcraft

Size:

110 x 70 x 35

Information:

The soap has a pleasant, mild, old-fashioned perfume. Under the picture of Mother Shipton are the words 'No boiling', so the soap would have been used for cleaning clothes. It was made at the Ivy Soap Works in Salford, Manchester, which was built for Charles Goodwin in 1874. The works was taken over by Colgate Palmolive-Peet in 1938, so the soap was probably made before that date.

For a similar soap see MWM object no. 4004.

For other examples of witch-related soap and soap advertising, see 612, 1825, 1841, 1987, 2080 and 2081. It seems that manufacturers thought that images of witches and magic would appeal to women purchasers, and that magic was an appropriate image to represent the transformative power of their soaps.

Resource:

Object

Materials:

Soap

Copyright ownership:

Treetrunk Ltd

The soap has a pleasant, mild, old-fashioned perfume. Under the picture of Mother Shipton are the words 'No boiling', so the soap would have been used for cleaning clothes. It was made at the Ivy Soap Works in Salford, Manchester, which was built for Charles Goodwin in 1874. The works was taken over by Colgate Palmolive-Peet in 1938, so the soap was probably made before that date.

For a similar soap see MWM object no. 4004.

For other examples of witch-related soap and soap advertising, see 612, 1825, 1841, 1987, 2080 and 2081. It seems that manufacturers thought that images of witches and magic would appeal to women purchasers, and that magic was an appropriate image to represent the transformative power of their soaps.