What are luffas made from?

Fat black bees pack their legs with pollen in the broad yellow blossoms of Rose Garcia’s luffa vines. An arch made of cheap metal mesh and zip ties is weighed down by the blossoming plants, with their broad leaves, tenacious tendrils reaching for neighboring trees, and slender gourds hanging beneath the arch.

The entire construction resembles a fairy house or something dreamed up by Studio Ghibli director Hayao Miyazaki, but is growing in the backyard of an ordinary Northeast Albuquerque home.

Luffas — the popular and fibrous cleaning and exfoliating sponge — come from the inside of luffa gourds. There are also plastic bath sponges with the same name.

Garcia always assumed luffas came from the sea. When the pandemic began, she wanted something unusual to grow in her garden, and discovered luffas come from the dried inside of gourds that are popular in China, Nepal, India and Vietnam.

“I didn’t want to grow tomatoes. Everybody grows tomatoes,” Garcia said. “I wanted to do something really different.”

So, she went online and ordered seeds from Amazon.

The gourd starts tiny and, if harvested early, can be eaten. But to make a good sponge, the luffas need almost a full season of light in New Mexico, from February to November. The green gourds, which are growing up to 2½-feet long, will brown and dry out by November.

“When they dry, you cut off both ends and then they unzip. They have these fibrous veins that you just kind of pull. Then it unzips and they just take off the little jacket. It just comes right off. It’s perfect,” Garcia said.

Removing the outer skin leaves behind the firm, fibrous inner structure.

“It makes this really wonderful scrub. Oh, it’s so wonderful to wash your body with,” she said.

With warm water, the luffa softens and can be used as a sponge. Luffas can be used not only as a bathing implement, but for household chores. Garcia’s husband Scott, who is also an artist, plans to use the liquid from inside the gourd to make paper.

The first year Garcia planted in June — too late for the luffas. The gourds didn’t mature in time. The next year, she planted in February and managed to harvest 17 gourds. Garcia is a professional hairdresser and an artist who is always trying to make new things, so she created bar soaps with shea butter and luffa pieces, for extra exfoliation, and gave them away to clients.

The gourds need a lot of sun and a lot of water, and with experience growing them, Garcia thought she could have a better harvest. Determined to grow more resplendent plants in year three, Garcia planted the luffas above a spot in her yard where she used to have an in-ground swimming pool.

“I figured all that water underneath will work as like a cup to feed them, and it’s worked out excellent,” she said.

Garcia expects a harvest of 150 gourds.