Howdy gents, and any members of the fairer sex who are present. I have haunted this forum and others for at least 10 years as I have considered making the jump to a DE Safety Razor for my shave from cartridges. I have hesitated for a couple of reasons, primarily I have been afraid I would slice my face off with a DESR(I'm still terrified of using my grandfather's straight edge). Also, the expense of getting into it, no razor ever jumping out at me, there was always another cartridge razor that promised it could give me a better shave than the competition, and the fact that the only DE Razors I have ever seen in person are Art of Shaving....which may or may not be a great razor, but they always struck me as one of those purchases you make, mess with a bit, and always wonder why you spent the money, fairly or not like stuff in a skymall magazine.
I am in my early 40s while I don't consider myself to have any crazy direction whiskers, they do seem to grow quick, very sand papery, and while the hair on my head is turning grey/silver, the hair on my face is staying as jet black and visible as ever. My dad started me on Bic disposable blue razors, when I was in college I bought myself a sensor excel....then sometime later a mach 3, a bic flex, a schick hydro 5, Dollar Shave Club, Harry's razors, and several others in the past 20 years. I believe I even had one that you put a battery in and it vibrated while shaving.....anyway....all of this time I was intrigued by DESR's, but again terrified I slice my face off.
About 9 or so years ago I discovered Taylor of Old Bond Street as opposed to shaving cream/gel and that actually made a more significant difference in my shaving then any change in disposable razors ever did. I never used a brush just hand applied it as a cream. As I said my whiskers seem to grow fairly straight, but just fast and very dark/visible on my tan skin so it's never been a comfort issue, I just hated seeing/feeling whiskers a couple of hours after a shave. I don't get the ruggedly handsome 5 o'clock shadow, I get the scruffy looking noon shadow. Razor burn not really an issue and I rarely bleed with a cartridge, unless I get stuck with a dull blade on a trip without any refills.... Anyway.
Last week I finally reached my point of frustration where I basically decided even if I slice my face off people will at least know I shaved...So I once again perused your board trying to find a razor to try. If I was going to do this I wanted a nice razor not just an entry razor...so I looked for a couple of days and even followed the face book page last Wednesday the facebook page posted this image from the Shave of the Day thread that was posted by Crossan:
Now I'm fully certain I had run across discussions/images of a Wolfman WR2 previously but this one just struck me and I was like "alright where do I get one of those?" It took a little more work then I thought, but I actually found one fairly quickly. It didn't have the darwin handle but it was the same 1.25 gap WR2 so I went for it. At this same time on a gun forum I frequent a member put up a wolf whisker handle for sale:
So I researched knots, eventually ordered a 26mm SHD 2 band badger from Maggard and deep dived into all things wet shaving/soap/cream/aftershave/Wolfman/pre-shave/whatever else.
Ended up ordering:
B&M Reserve Spice(loved the bottle I had from my grandfather that was from the 50s) Aftershave and soap
Blu Atlas Aftershave and Cream
Platinum Coated Feather Razors
Green Proraso After Shave
Nick Sticks
Astra Platinum Razors
Dr Johns Flowers in the Dark Soap and Aftershave
Captains Choice Heavyweight Shaving Bowl
Holy Black Gunpowder Spice
Grooming Dept Lavender Pre-shave
and maybe some other things I'm not thinking of.....
Anyway, all that said, the WR2 showed up this morning at my office the same time as my Blu Atlas order.....This was 3 hours after my shower, I have a 3 day growth last shaving on Easter morning, nothing but paper towels in the bathrooms, no real way to do any true preshave, no brush(which I have learned you don't need with Blu Atlas Cream), and the only razors being the gillette perma-sharps that the seller included with the razor(they may be good or bad I have no idea, they weren't one of the ones people typically mention using with WR2 but anyway). So all sense and intelligence screams to wait until I go home and can shave properly....nope.
So in a public bathroom I slapped some hot water on my face applied a small amount of Blu Atlas to my right cheek and rubbed it and very gingerly applied the razor to my face trying to keep in mind all I had read by various posters about using a steep handle angle with a WR2 shaving with the grain.
Now I am deaf and use a Cochlear Implant on my left side(ride side is nothing at all) and I after a little adjustment could hear this razor cutting. After shaving off the small area I started with I did my whole right cheek. Then my left Cheek, then my chin, then oh so gingerly the area above my lip. Finally I did my neck( which I am going to have to work on remembering which direction is with grain and which is against the grain on my neck), I got a little cocky here as everything was going so well and smooth and I had a small weeper near my adams apple.
And there 1st pass with the grain was done. Some areas were completely smooth, some areas were not, but my skin was still on my face and the sink wasn't full of blood.
So I went again, XTG this time, lathered all at once. It went well all in all, not as great as WTG, but a good shaving experience.
I have read a lot of people say ATG is the riskiest and hardest to not have issues but here we went. I actually found ATG to be easier for me then XTG at least so far. After I was done I had a little touching up on some spots on my neck, but while I am not going to say this is a BBS shave.....it's better than any shave I have ever done myself. I have some barely detectable stubble on my neck and right below the corners of my Jaw, but nothing visible which in and of itself is amazing. Saw my wife briefly earlier and she was a huge fan of the smoothness on my face. I have a lot of learning still to do but I heartily enjoyed my first experience with the razor. Might like to chase down a titanium darwin handle in the future in a narrower gap. Will be interesting how long the shave holds up and if I will be shaving manana or not, but I am grinning currently.
If you are frustrated with cartridge shaves I heartily encourage you to try DESRs, a very rewarding experience.
Other than the weeper on my adams apple I had one small dab of blood on the left corner of my mouth, but I often got that with cartridges anyway.
Face is smooth and feels good. No rash no burn.
Big fan of Blu Atlas, though I am uncertain if I am using enough. The aftershave is great as well. Hopefully this stuff goes a decent bit, or I can forget about saving any money over cartridges.
I am in my early 40s while I don't consider myself to have any crazy direction whiskers, they do seem to grow quick, very sand papery, and while the hair on my head is turning grey/silver, the hair on my face is staying as jet black and visible as ever. My dad started me on Bic disposable blue razors, when I was in college I bought myself a sensor excel....then sometime later a mach 3, a bic flex, a schick hydro 5, Dollar Shave Club, Harry's razors, and several others in the past 20 years. I believe I even had one that you put a battery in and it vibrated while shaving.....anyway....all of this time I was intrigued by DESR's, but again terrified I slice my face off.
About 9 or so years ago I discovered Taylor of Old Bond Street as opposed to shaving cream/gel and that actually made a more significant difference in my shaving then any change in disposable razors ever did. I never used a brush just hand applied it as a cream. As I said my whiskers seem to grow fairly straight, but just fast and very dark/visible on my tan skin so it's never been a comfort issue, I just hated seeing/feeling whiskers a couple of hours after a shave. I don't get the ruggedly handsome 5 o'clock shadow, I get the scruffy looking noon shadow. Razor burn not really an issue and I rarely bleed with a cartridge, unless I get stuck with a dull blade on a trip without any refills.... Anyway.
Last week I finally reached my point of frustration where I basically decided even if I slice my face off people will at least know I shaved...So I once again perused your board trying to find a razor to try. If I was going to do this I wanted a nice razor not just an entry razor...so I looked for a couple of days and even followed the face book page last Wednesday the facebook page posted this image from the Shave of the Day thread that was posted by Crossan:
Now I'm fully certain I had run across discussions/images of a Wolfman WR2 previously but this one just struck me and I was like "alright where do I get one of those?" It took a little more work then I thought, but I actually found one fairly quickly. It didn't have the darwin handle but it was the same 1.25 gap WR2 so I went for it. At this same time on a gun forum I frequent a member put up a wolf whisker handle for sale:
So I researched knots, eventually ordered a 26mm SHD 2 band badger from Maggard and deep dived into all things wet shaving/soap/cream/aftershave/Wolfman/pre-shave/whatever else.
Ended up ordering:
B&M Reserve Spice(loved the bottle I had from my grandfather that was from the 50s) Aftershave and soap
Blu Atlas Aftershave and Cream
Platinum Coated Feather Razors
Green Proraso After Shave
Nick Sticks
Astra Platinum Razors
Dr Johns Flowers in the Dark Soap and Aftershave
Captains Choice Heavyweight Shaving Bowl
Holy Black Gunpowder Spice
Grooming Dept Lavender Pre-shave
and maybe some other things I'm not thinking of.....
Anyway, all that said, the WR2 showed up this morning at my office the same time as my Blu Atlas order.....This was 3 hours after my shower, I have a 3 day growth last shaving on Easter morning, nothing but paper towels in the bathrooms, no real way to do any true preshave, no brush(which I have learned you don't need with Blu Atlas Cream), and the only razors being the gillette perma-sharps that the seller included with the razor(they may be good or bad I have no idea, they weren't one of the ones people typically mention using with WR2 but anyway). So all sense and intelligence screams to wait until I go home and can shave properly....nope.
So in a public bathroom I slapped some hot water on my face applied a small amount of Blu Atlas to my right cheek and rubbed it and very gingerly applied the razor to my face trying to keep in mind all I had read by various posters about using a steep handle angle with a WR2 shaving with the grain.
Now I am deaf and use a Cochlear Implant on my left side(ride side is nothing at all) and I after a little adjustment could hear this razor cutting. After shaving off the small area I started with I did my whole right cheek. Then my left Cheek, then my chin, then oh so gingerly the area above my lip. Finally I did my neck( which I am going to have to work on remembering which direction is with grain and which is against the grain on my neck), I got a little cocky here as everything was going so well and smooth and I had a small weeper near my adams apple.
And there 1st pass with the grain was done. Some areas were completely smooth, some areas were not, but my skin was still on my face and the sink wasn't full of blood.
So I went again, XTG this time, lathered all at once. It went well all in all, not as great as WTG, but a good shaving experience.
I have read a lot of people say ATG is the riskiest and hardest to not have issues but here we went. I actually found ATG to be easier for me then XTG at least so far. After I was done I had a little touching up on some spots on my neck, but while I am not going to say this is a BBS shave.....it's better than any shave I have ever done myself. I have some barely detectable stubble on my neck and right below the corners of my Jaw, but nothing visible which in and of itself is amazing. Saw my wife briefly earlier and she was a huge fan of the smoothness on my face. I have a lot of learning still to do but I heartily enjoyed my first experience with the razor. Might like to chase down a titanium darwin handle in the future in a narrower gap. Will be interesting how long the shave holds up and if I will be shaving manana or not, but I am grinning currently.
If you are frustrated with cartridge shaves I heartily encourage you to try DESRs, a very rewarding experience.
Other than the weeper on my adams apple I had one small dab of blood on the left corner of my mouth, but I often got that with cartridges anyway.
Face is smooth and feels good. No rash no burn.
Big fan of Blu Atlas, though I am uncertain if I am using enough. The aftershave is great as well. Hopefully this stuff goes a decent bit, or I can forget about saving any money over cartridges.
