Lynchmeister
04-12-2007, 10:07 AM
Well I'm happy to report that I've welcomed soaps back into my shaving fold. For the longest time I just could not figure them out despite all of the suggestions here. I attributed my past failures to poor water quality (read: hard), but now I think it was due to my lathering technique. I'm positive that it wasn't a poorly primed brush, because I would literally beat the hell out of the brush and soap.
In my past attempts, I would follow the typical soap lathering process of soaking brush, a little water on the soap, prime the brush a lot over the lather bowl to catch the drip, and then move to the bowl where I would whip out a very good looking, but poor performing lather. It would deteriorate and dry out on my face before I was halfway through my first pass. After a few times of this, I simply put the soaps away and gave up.
A few weeks ago, I read a thread by Ead, where he was describing similar problems in his quest for getting a good shave from a soap. A couple days later he reported success. I also read a theory that by whipping the lather in the bowl, you were beating more air into it, which would decrease the lubricity of the lather. Made sense to me. More air equals less water, right? This was enough for me to give the soap at least another shot.
This morning I brought out my QED Lemon and Cedarwood soap and followed the above routine, but instead of moving to a bowl, I went straight to the face, occasionally dipping the brush in hot water to keep things wet. I also employed another trick that has helped me with creams. I hold the brush in my left hand and my razor in the right so that I can periodically relather mid-pass. This has greatly improved the quality, quantity, and moisture of the lather on my face as I shave.
I finished the whole thing off with the alum block, a few spritzes of witch hazel, a splash of Aqua Velva, and a schmear of QED Texas Cedarwood EO skin conditioner. Very nice indeed!
In my past attempts, I would follow the typical soap lathering process of soaking brush, a little water on the soap, prime the brush a lot over the lather bowl to catch the drip, and then move to the bowl where I would whip out a very good looking, but poor performing lather. It would deteriorate and dry out on my face before I was halfway through my first pass. After a few times of this, I simply put the soaps away and gave up.
A few weeks ago, I read a thread by Ead, where he was describing similar problems in his quest for getting a good shave from a soap. A couple days later he reported success. I also read a theory that by whipping the lather in the bowl, you were beating more air into it, which would decrease the lubricity of the lather. Made sense to me. More air equals less water, right? This was enough for me to give the soap at least another shot.
This morning I brought out my QED Lemon and Cedarwood soap and followed the above routine, but instead of moving to a bowl, I went straight to the face, occasionally dipping the brush in hot water to keep things wet. I also employed another trick that has helped me with creams. I hold the brush in my left hand and my razor in the right so that I can periodically relather mid-pass. This has greatly improved the quality, quantity, and moisture of the lather on my face as I shave.
I finished the whole thing off with the alum block, a few spritzes of witch hazel, a splash of Aqua Velva, and a schmear of QED Texas Cedarwood EO skin conditioner. Very nice indeed!