Puck in my bowl or not?

[danxaz]

When I first started using a brush I used Van der Hagen in a mug. I got the puck wet, pushed it into the bottom of the mug then let it dry. The puck sticks pretty well, usually stays put until it's gone. Now I just watched one of Mantic's Youtube videos where he says it's wasteful to produce your lather in the same bowl that your puck resides. So, am I supposed to have two mugs, one with my puck and one just to build a lather? I find it hard to believe that this is what guys used to do when brushes were the norm. I tried holding the puck in my hand to load the brush then transferring to a bowl, but that was just too messy for my taste. I suppose I could start exclusively face-lathering instead of building a lather in a bowl. What do you all do?

[Cynomys]

I keep my soap pucks in separate bowls - I have a ramikin and an Old Spice bowl. Then I use a separate bowl for fully building the lather. Actually, I have a few different bowls which I use for lather building. I haven't found just the right one yet. I think you'll find most folks do use a separate bowl for building lather. The lather bowl can have little ridges in the bottom, for example, to help incorporate air into the lather which isn't possible if you build your lather directly on the puck.

[JoshuaNY]

I am a bowl latherer, I decided it was easier to learn that way and have not moved into face lathering yet. But it would be wasteful to build lather in the same mug your soap is in.

All of my soaps have their own homes in various containers, containers and I have a large Latte mug I use to build lather. So I load using whatever soap the container is in for 30 seconds or so, then build the lather in the latte mug.

Most face latherers, load then just work the lather onto their face.

[AABCDS]

I have a separate bowl where I make the lather and multiple bowls for all my soaps. You can build lather wherever you like. I can understand that it's wasteful but a puck of soap really isn't that much money. What are you going to do? Try to make it last until 3017?

[Neognosis]

It's only wasteful if you dump the lather you don't use out. When I used to lather on the puck I just let it sit there and dry out until next time.

So, am I supposed to have two mugs, one with my puck and one just to build a lather? I find it hard to believe that this is what guys used to do when brushes were the norm.

My father built lather on the puck for decades. Probably 1/2 puck and 1/2 face lather. I suspect that the "norm" used to be mostly loading the brush on the puck with a little lather building, and then face lathering. I don't think men used to put so much emphasis on getting the lather all pretty and such.

[LegionPrime]

I am a bowl latherer, I decided it was easier to learn that way and have not moved into face lathering yet. But it would be wasteful to build lather in the same mug your soap is in.

Is it less wasteful to rinse the leftover lather from your lathercup out rather than leave it on the puck for the next shave?
If you're using the $1.50 VDH puck I just put it the bowl that came with their boxed kit, put that in a bowl of water and microwave it for a minute at a time until it's melted enough that the melted soap can cover any that's still solid. Then I take it out and give it a bit of a stir which usually melts the rest and leave it out overnight to cool. Solves any problems one might have with their pucks mobility and eliminates any sort of petri dish effect that may take place underneath the puck. DONE
Oh right, lathering. I personally bowl lather as most soaps that come in tins/bowls when full don't have ANY room to build up a lather and even when empty still don't have enough room, and I still haven't found a way to build a lather in a tube of cream LoL. I went with bowl lathering as I found it gave me enough room to work with to build a worthwhile lather and gave me better control over soap/water ratios. It's not as easy to add more product off a puck if you get too much water, but I have found it easier for myself to start with a drier brush & add water as I go.

[michiganlover]

Lathering in the same vessel that contains the puck "lathering on the puck" is my preferred method of lather building. It is slightly more wasteful that loading the brush, and then building the lather in a separate bowl/mug.

I think the men of past when shaving soap, and shaving brushes were popular largely lathered on the puck, shaving was a chore to be completed as quickly as possible, they didn't get all fancy with it.

Lathering on the puck, or lathering in a separate bowl are really just opposite methods of accomplishing the same goal: Lathering on the puck starts off with a brush that is too wet, and adds soap until optimal lather is reached. Lathering in a separate bowl starts out with too much soap, and adds water until an optimal lather is reached.

[Go West Young Man]

I have my soaps all in small storage tins with screwtops, just pop whatever one I'm using open, load the brush and then either go to a lathering bowl or directly to the face (depends on which brush I'm using).

[danxaz]

It seems most lather in separate bowls. A follow up question: How do you explain to your wives the need for so much space in the bathroom with all these bowls?

[BigBull]

How do you explain to your wives the need for so much space in the bathroom with all these bowls?

Why does she need soo many pairs of shoes?

Disclaimer: This isn't my original line...but it worked for me!

[Rustonrazor]

It seems most lather in separate bowls. A follow up question: How do you explain to your wives the need for so much space in the bathroom with all these bowls?

Wait, explain.........I'm lost??

[Rustonrazor]

As to my practice, I have just started bowl lathering. I load from the puck in a separate container then bowl lather.

[dreadpirate]

Good one!

Why does she need soo many pairs of shoes?

Disclaimer: This isn't my original line...but it worked for me!

[Deltaboy]

I use 2 bowl as a lather warmer so I load on the puck then over the the bowl to build some lather.

[dreadpirate]

I am a face latherer (is that a word?). But - I think it's a good idea to keep the soap covered. So (if it were me) I would leave the puck in a covered dish and use another bowl / mug for lathering.

[The Kiwi]

As a totally self-taught shaver, I started with canned Barbasol and Noxzema foams when I graduated from using the bar soap on the wash basin's rear indentation. I had a full Old Spice gift set, with soaps, deodorants, brush, mug, cologne, and aftershave. Most of the stuff stayed in the gift box the first couple of years after I got it.

One day, I took out the mug and soap, wet the brush, and swirled it on the soap. A weak lather started, and when I moved the brush to my wet face, the lather doubled itself, so I found out about face-lathering on my first try, and it worked very well. I enjoyed the results much better than using the canned product, although the actual quality of the shave, the closeness, etc, wasn't particularly different, but my face and skin FELT so much better than when I used the ordinary foams (I don't know if the different brands had anything other than "menthol and regular" flavors yet).

I do know that one or more of the ones I tried had the same result as many current ones do, they dried my face & made my skin feel stiff, instead of supple, and I was still mostly a kid. My skin was supposed to be somewhat fresh and soft still. And the Old Spice soap smelled pretty good.

This isn't to claim I immediately gave up the canned foams. I didn't. But I was using the shave soap for my social occasions (again, not claiming I dated a lot, yet, because girls still made me anxious and nervous then).

I couple of years after that, I tried Gillette's "brushless" shave cream, and wasn't greatly impressed, but the Palmolive of that era was very nice. It didn't seem to lather really well on my face; I had widespread variations from one part of my face to another in wetness, slipperiness, etc -- it was then that I borrowed a coffee mug first as a place to whip the snurdle of cream to a lather. But that wasn't a longterm solution. Some kind of bowl, about the side of a cereal bowl, seemed very useful.

For awhile, I hardly used any soaps at all, but none of the creams I found at retail were scented to much of any extent, and I missed that, with the Old Spice soap. By the late 1960s, I'd taught myself to face lather and to bowl-lather, and had cut way back on using the canned foams. I got away from the creams while mostly using Edge Gel with my Sensor between 1993 and late 2011; now I have a neat, inexpensive salsa bowl with stubby little legs that I use for bowl-lathering.

[rebos]

nothing wrong with building lather on the puck. might not want to do it for really expensive soaps but for cheaper soaps, it doesn't much matter.