Soap Happens in Silver City

BRENDA MCFARLANE DESCRIBES herself as “challenged, perspiration-wise.” Store-bought remedies just didn’t work. So McFarlane, who moved to Silver City from San Diego in 2015, spent about two years experimenting to craft her own recipe for natural deodorant lotions. It worked so well, she started selling them, eventually developing a full line of small-batch lotions, soaps, powdered toothpaste, serums, and even dry shampoo and salves for four-legged friends now available at Ziryab’s Body Brew.

The shop’s name pays tribute to the ninth-century artist and inventor of deodorant. “It represents my embracing of global cultures and traditions,” says McFarlane, who operates the Silver City store and a new location in Mesilla, which opened last May, with her husband, Kevin Stratton. 

McFarlane draws on many of the traditions her grandmother passed down, like using baking soda to brush her teeth and putting rainwater in her hair. Even with advances in hair and body products, she says, “Those [natural] ways are still something that some people might want.” McFarlane, who gathers herbs and other local flora for her formulas, is constantly experimenting to formulate new products, such as a whipped tallow moisturizer and pine tar shampoo. 

Customers and Ziryab’s employees rave about the chaparral soap bar, which smells like the desert after a rainstorm. But McFarlane’s favorite scent might just be lavender, which transports her back to her childhood visiting the Canadian National Exhibition. “There was a woman selling lavender sachets,” McFarlane says. “I remember thinking, This is the best smell ever.”