Give the gift of relaxation with this compendium of New Mexico-made body products. Prices generally range from around $5 for a bar of soap to about $14 for lotions and the like, while a gift set can go for up to $30.
Betty's Body Bliss
Betty’s Bath & Day Spa, located in Albuquerque, bottles the lovely lemongrass-y scent used in its treatments. The distinctive fragrance comes in the form of lotion, shower gel, foot balm and massage oil.
Clear Light
Located in Placitas, Clear Light has been improving the world with green cedar needles for 38 years. Its body products—which are cedar-heavy, but not cedar-exclusive (the company has a lavender field, for instance)—include lotions, soaps, body oils, powders, bath soaks and shower gels. It also makes hair care products, home fragrance, cleaning products, candles, incense and sachets.
Enchanted Lavender
This high-desert grower offers soaps, butters, balms, sprays, salts, oils, candles, sachets, bouquets and a bounty of lavender accoutrements.
Frolicking Deer Lavender Farm
Based in Datil, N.M., this lavender farm’s fragrant product line includes lotions, bath salts shower gel, oils, spa products and even lavender pet shampoo.
Haven Scent Handcrafted Soap & Bath
Offerings from this Santa Fe company include a variety of soaps, salts, balms, lotions, oils, scrubbies and other restorative odds and ends.
High Desert Essentials
Specializing in a trinity of uniquely New Mexican aromas—piñon, juniper and sage—this Albuquerque-based company offers chemical-free, Tibetan-style incense; handmade, vegetable-based soaps; palm wax candles; hydrosol (floral water); body butter; and gift boxes containing mixtures of the aforementioned goodies. The proprietor, Chris Norton, also owns Sandia Soap (sandiasoap.com), which offers even more handmade natural soaps inspired by our state.
Laughing Turtle Soap Co.
Laughing Turtle creates oils, scents, dead sea salts, body butters, lippy balms and a cute little turtle-and-frog lotion bar set, all made in Albuquerque.
Los Poblanos
Ever the wearer of many hats, Los Poblanos in Los Ranchos is an organic farm, a historic inn, a cultural center and a general New Mexican wonderland. It also has a line of lavender body products made from the organic essential oil of 4,000 plants on its lavender farm. All-natural, paraben-free products include shampoo and conditioner, body wash, hand lotion, soap and a salve that’s reportedly a "magic elixir" for pregnant bellies and chapped hands.
Martha's Body Bueno
The store is gone, but Martha still makes a ton of relaxation-based products (and some sexy ones, too) for bath, shower, body, massage, face or anything else you can imagine.
Sage Mountain Soap Company
This company sells, well, soap. But it also carries bath oils, lip therapy treatments, lotions and body polishes, among other bath luxuries, all of which are completely natural and made in small batches. Sage Mountain even has peppermint and cinnamon soaps to put you in the mood … for the holidays.
Southwestern Soapworks
This Angel Fire company makes shower gels, organic lotions, spa-safe bath salts, candles, glycerin soaps and natural handmade soaps. Look for gift bags and calming scents like cedar and sage, lavender and sweet grass, and prickly pear.
Ten Thousand Waves
Anyone can possess the scents found at Santa Fe’s famous mountainside spa. Hinoki (piñon and juniper), shobu (Japanese iris) and yuzu (Japanese citrus) come in the form of shower gels, lotions, mists, shampoos and conditioners, salts, oils, and soap.
