Easy Tutorial: How to Make Sponges from Luffa Gourds

Help us Grow! Please Share

Growing luffa gourds in the garden is a fun project, but washing with an awkwardly shaped sponge is difficult! With a bit of time and a few simple materials, you can transform that oblong gourd into your own luffa sponge that is perfect for the shower or the kitchen! 

What are luffa sponges?

Luffa sponges are not a sea sponge, but a sponge gourd that you grow in the garden. These plants thrive in a warmer climate, but can be grown in cooler climates with a little TLC throughout their long growing season. Luffa vines are prolific! Be sure to give them plenty of space and good trellising to keep them off the ground. 

Transforming a Luffa into a Usable Sponge

Depending on the climate where you live determines how you prepare your luffa fruit to create a usable sponge. When we lived in Florida, I left the luffa gourds to dry right on the vines. As the gourds dry, the outer skin turns brown. The luffa fruit becomes lighter, and you will hear the seeds rattling inside.

Here at the homestead in Kentucky, we don’t have the luxury of allowing the gourds to vine-dry. Luffas have a long growing season. Allowing the gourds to dry on the vine is even longer. Luffas require frost-free days. As your weather turns cooler and the potential for the first frost nears, keep a close eye on the temperatures. If the fruit freezes, the fibers inside the luffa will be ruined. 

Harvesting Luffas

My preference is to leave the luffas on the vine as long as possible.  At the first chance of frost, harvest everything! If your season is longer, many of your luffas may have brown skin and be close to processing. In cooler climates, you may harvest green fruit that will need some extra effort to transform the gourds into sponges. 

Luffas that are close to being dried out can be put in a dry place to dry completely. While you can allow green fruit to dry in this same manner, I found it much too difficult. Philip helped me to painstakingly hang the green luffas in my living room (yes, in our RV). However, despite my best efforts, the luffas began to mold. In my personal experience, I have found the best thing to do if your fruit is still green is to process it green. 

Processing the Luffas

Preparing dry luffas is pretty easy. At the blossom end of the luffa, you will find a round “button” for lack of a better term. This usually pops off easily. You can shake as many seeds out of the luffa as possible through this hole. After you have removed as many seeds as possible, peel the brown skin off the sponge. Some will be easy to peel off, while some may be a bit more challenging.  I find it easier to squeeze the luffa and break up the skin to peel it off.  If you have very stubborn skin, you can soak it to help get it off. 

Green luffas require a bit more work, but aren’t necessarily harder to process; they just require a bit of elbow grease. Very young luffas may not have developed enough to create a usable sponge. In those cases, I just compost the immature luffas. I have tried eating the small green luffas, and personally, I will stick to zucchini!

Steps to Processing Green Fruit

To process the green fruit, you will need to break through the outer skin. Some people step on them to do this, or you can break the skin with your hands. The fruit is pretty sturdy, and I didn’t damage any fruit when breaking through the green skin. 

Once you crack the skin, peel off the green skin. It’s not as difficult as I thought, and peeled off easier in some ways than chipping off the dried brown skin. I have also seen a method of baking the luffas in the oven to start the drying process that makes them easier to peel as well. I’ll have to give that method a try! 

Once the green luffas are peeled, you will feel the sticky sap on the soft fibers of the sponge. Rinse the luffa sponge under warm water. Don’t be afraid to squeeze the sponges as you rinse to get as much of the sap out as possible. 

After you rinse the sponges, hang them to dry, or on warm days, put them out in the sun to dry. You want to be careful in this drying process so the sponges don’t mold. Hanging them to dry works better as there is no part of the sponge that remains damp.

Once the sponges are dried, shake out as many of the remaining seeds as possible. If you are leaving your luffas whole, you may want to put more effort into this, but if you are cutting the luffas, it’s easier to pick them out once cut.

Cleaning the Luffas

The next step before creating sponges is to clean the luffas. If you prefer, you can leave the luffas completely natural. I would recommend at the very least of boiling them in hot water to sanitize. I like to bleach my sponges in a light bleach solution with 9 parts water to one part bleach. You can also clean with peroxide, which has some whitening properties as well. 

Supplies You Need to Create a Usable Luffa Sponge

Steps to Creating a Usable Sponge from a Dried Luffa

Sewing the Sponge

To sew the luffa into a usable sponge, I use butcher’s twine. Butcher’s twine is unbleached, cotton thread that is safe for cooking, so it’s safe to use during bath time.

Natural Usable Sponges

Using homegrown sponges means I have tossed my synthetic sponges for an all-natural sponge that’s perfect in the shower, but it also works great in the kitchen. The tough interwoven fibers of a natural luffa sponge are sturdy enough to scrub dirty dishes, but gentle enough to clean my sensitive skin, leaving it exfoliated and feeling clean. The best part is that when the sponge has been worn beyond use, it’s safe to toss it into the compost pile. Luffas are FULL of seeds, making it easy to grow a new batch each year for fresh sponges year-round.