Rooney Pure

[Oscroft]

I like a variety of different brush feels - anything from a really soft silvetip to something firm with a bit of scritch, depending on my mood. In the scritchy stakes, I've used a couple of "Pure" brushes, but they were just too scritchy, with 100% clipped hairs - but they were cheap.

I also recently got a Rooney 3/1 Best, which was on offer at a bargain price, and I love the hair - it's really not far from Rooney Silvertip (I have a 3/1 Silvertip too).

So I started wondering what Rooney Pure is like. If their Best is so good, the Pure will surely be better than the cheapie Pure brushes I've tried, I reckoned - and Rooney Pure is quite a bit more expensive than my Pure cheapies. Only one way to find out, so I ordered one. It arrived today, and I've just had my first shave with it.

And I have to say I think it's terrific. It exfoliates well, and it left my skin feeling really good, but without being over-scritchy. A close look shows it has a mix of clipped and unclipped hairs, and the unclipped ones are very fine. (Strangely, there was one bright blue hair in it, which I suspect was a fibre of packing material or something like that, rather than any kind of rare blue mountain badger!) It seems to me like this brush is made with a specific performance in mind, rather than being made as cheaply as possible like many of the Pure brushes out there.

I used MWF, and I got so much lather it made it look like I was having a pie fight in a slapstick movie. Followed by a fatboy loaded with an Iridium Super, I got as good a BBS as I've had in ages.

And that's something else I've noticed about Rooney brushes - there hasn't been a hint of funk or dirt in any of my three, and they've been ready to go straight out of the box. Definitely amongst the best cleaned and prepared badger hair I've come across.

The light isn't good now, but when it is I'll get a photo of my nice Rooney 3/1 trio

[The Chandos]

And that's something else I've noticed about Rooney brushes - there hasn't been a hint of funk or dirt in any of my three, and they've been ready to go straight out of the box. Definitely amongst the best cleaned and prepared badger hair I've come across.

Nice feedback, Oscroft, it's good to know that even the lower end or bottom line brushes from some companies are still worth every penny. Personally, my Rooney's are some of my favorite and I agree that their quality seems to be a bit better than many others for the category they put themselves in (not pointing my fingers at any one company, either, just saying from a variety of experiences) and softer too. I also have to say +1 "straight out of the box" comment you make. Both of my Rooney's have been used straight out of the box with no funk, dyes, or powders and minimal hair loss.