Alum Block or Witch Hazel or Both?

Witch hazel's arrived, Alum's in the post. Does anyone use both after a shave?

I usually use alum after a first cold rinse, and let the alum sit on my face while I do clean-up. Rinse alum off and splash with non-alcohol witch hazel (I like the thayer's scented).

diverdoug said:

I usually use alum after a first cold rinse, and let the alum sit on my face while I do clean-up. Rinse alum off and splash with non-alcohol witch hazel (I like the thayer's scented).

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Cheers mate, it's the thayers I've got, the rose and the lavender.

The 3 I have are rose, lavender, and cucumber (cucumber is my favorite).

Fudgie1973 said:

Witch hazel's arrived, Alum's in the post. Does anyone use both after a shave?

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I use one or the other after warm rinse. Let either dry then cold rinse and the AS balm. However, do whatever you find works best for you. As you follow this website you will see that there are infinite ways to get a good satisfying wet shave.

Fudgie1973 said:

Cheers mate, it's the thayers I've got, the rose and the lavender.

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I use the Rose. It is excellent. I spash it on my face and forehead areas (I get dry skin in the Winter time). Really helps condition the skin. Once that dries, I follow up with Musgo Real Balm on the shaved areas. Nice and smooth, with a pleasant old world scent.

The lavender feels nice too, I just found the scent to be a little too strong for my tastes. I like to smell either like the Musgo Real or C&E Nomad when I walk out the door.

My routine:

Finish my last pass
Warm water rinse (to get off all residual soap)
Cold water rinse (astringent -- feels great at this time of the year)
While face still wet, apply alum block for a minute or so
Cold water rinse (to get off residual alum)
Apply WH (I use the generic -- and I don't mind the smell at all! I use a small atomizer to apply, then rub it in with my hands)
While WH dries, clean up the sink & shaving stuff
Apply aftershave
Apply cologne (if required that day)
DONE!

There are days when I only use either the alum or WH, and sometimes I don't use an AS or cologne, but the above is the "full monty". As with all things, experiment and see what works best for you. Enjoy!

I just started with the ALUM block yesterday, kept it on all day and splashed some Thayers over it. My face seems dry or it may be from the 2 days before when I used a 14% alcohol witch hazel. (TN Dickinsons).

Today I did the alum block and some truefitt balm. Ill see tonight how that worked out...

Do any of you guys leave the alum on? I thought it was a substitute for witch hazel so I have been leaving it on...

I apply alum after my shave then when it has dried sufficiently I splash some generic Witch Hazel to sort of rinse off the alum. Then when the WH has dried I come back and apply the AS.

When I had the Canadian Traveling Box and lots of different products on my shelf, I found the following (fairly ridiculous) routine worked great:

-warm then cold rinse-
alum
-cold rinse-
witch hazel
-let dry-
after shave splash
-let dry-
moisturizer

I suspect that the key was using a real moisturizer at the end, but it did seem that using both alum and witch hazel was better than using just one of them. Unfortunately, with the small sample size, I can't say that all this wasn't due to better shaves some days...

Unlike most, I usually shower AFTER a shave. So generally I shave, rinse with cold water, apply alum, spend a few minutes cleaning up shaving area/equipment, take a shower, then I apply witch hazel (no rinse) afterwards. I just use store brand witch hazel. Works great for me.