I didn't realize there was a new member thread, and since I had recently joined and posted, I figured I should also say Hi.
I've been shaving with cartridges for decades, from the 3-bladed Atra to, most recently, a 5-blade from BIC (Made for You). And for the most part got pretty decent shaves. However, over the past several months I have noticed that not only have my shaves been getting less close, but the irritation from shaving was getting worse. I thought that maybe there was a bad cartridge in the batch, but it was prevalent throughout the whole batch of 12 and then into another one. Finally, a light bulb went off as I took a good look in the mirror and realized - hmmm...maybe it's because of all the gray whiskers?
So, I looked into solutions to the shaving issue and discovered that using a single-edge or double-edge razor is actually better for both shaving and also for your skin. I did a lot of research on it (thank you B&B for a good deal of it) and decided to give the "wet shaving" route a go. I figured that while it would probably take more time to shave, requiring getting up earlier in the morning, even if I have to do 3 passes along with possible touch-ups, it is still less blades scraping my skin than a single pass with the cartridge and typically I required 2 passes with touch ups (10-15 blades touching the skin!)
About a month ago I picked up a Merkur 34c, a synthetic brush (didn't want to have to deal with the soaking of badger brush and also wanted to make sure that this was for me before dropping lots of money), some Stirling shave soap - Bay Rum and also Haverford (which smells awesome BTW), and a 15-tuck sample pack of blades.
I have been enjoying the process, taking time to shave, trying out different blades to see which ones work best for me, and thinking about all the other shave soap scents I want to try. I now look forward to shaving instead of dreading it as a chore.
- Manny
I've been shaving with cartridges for decades, from the 3-bladed Atra to, most recently, a 5-blade from BIC (Made for You). And for the most part got pretty decent shaves. However, over the past several months I have noticed that not only have my shaves been getting less close, but the irritation from shaving was getting worse. I thought that maybe there was a bad cartridge in the batch, but it was prevalent throughout the whole batch of 12 and then into another one. Finally, a light bulb went off as I took a good look in the mirror and realized - hmmm...maybe it's because of all the gray whiskers?
So, I looked into solutions to the shaving issue and discovered that using a single-edge or double-edge razor is actually better for both shaving and also for your skin. I did a lot of research on it (thank you B&B for a good deal of it) and decided to give the "wet shaving" route a go. I figured that while it would probably take more time to shave, requiring getting up earlier in the morning, even if I have to do 3 passes along with possible touch-ups, it is still less blades scraping my skin than a single pass with the cartridge and typically I required 2 passes with touch ups (10-15 blades touching the skin!)
About a month ago I picked up a Merkur 34c, a synthetic brush (didn't want to have to deal with the soaking of badger brush and also wanted to make sure that this was for me before dropping lots of money), some Stirling shave soap - Bay Rum and also Haverford (which smells awesome BTW), and a 15-tuck sample pack of blades.
I have been enjoying the process, taking time to shave, trying out different blades to see which ones work best for me, and thinking about all the other shave soap scents I want to try. I now look forward to shaving instead of dreading it as a chore.
- Manny
