Audi Soap Museum

Restored soap factory tracing the history of olive-oil soap in the Levant

The Audi Soap Museum sits inside a beautifully restored 17th-century stone building that was a working soap factory until the late 20th century. Founded by the Audi family, it traces the long history of olive-oil and laurel soap production in the eastern Mediterranean, from Phoenician times through the Ottoman period to the present.

The exhibits walk you through the entire production process: the great stone vats where olive oil and lye were mixed, the cooling beds where the soap was poured and cut, and the upper-floor curing rooms with their original wooden grids where bars dried for months. The museum is small but exceptionally well presented, with bilingual signage and a quiet courtyard cafe at the end. The attached shop sells handmade soaps that make excellent souvenirs.

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A story
Olive-oil soap was a Sidon export for centuries, traded across the Mediterranean from the same harbour the Phoenicians built. The Audi family ran a soap workshop here from the 17th century until the 1970s. The original moulds, vats, and curing rooms are all preserved — when soap is being made for the gift shop, you can still smell the laurel and olive oil drifting through the rooms.

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