Good morning B&B,
just thought I'd share my excitement over wet shaving. For a bit of my personal shaving history, I had to start shaving around the age of 15 (mere 14 years ago by now) and at that time I believe Mach 3 was introduced to the market. As a kiddo that had no-one to teach him how to shave, I got a can of gillete foam, Mach 3 and some spare cartridges and had to make do.
I stuck with cartridge shaving for all those 14 years, trying different stuff until settiling for the vibrating Mach 3 and shaving gels from can, always viewing wet shaving as something only old farts did and not being worth the time - from which you can already sense that the whole shaving experience for me was not really nice and pleasant - burns, even nicks all the time, no matter what balm or treatment I used afterwards.
My love for cartridge shaving was furthermore reinforced in 2004, when I started to loose hair and decided to shave it off completely instead of trying to mask it - lucky for me I have very, very nice and round skull, so I kinda look badass since then
But hey, cartridge shavers (M3) was the best to get the job done effectively, the only thing I really dreaded was the consumable cost - if I didn't shave every day and shaved (the head especially) only every other day, it was very usual to dull the cartridge in 2 shaves, even the second face shave usually was harder. Somewhat I begrugingly stuck with this way of shaving until this weekend...
This weekend, me and my girlfriend decided to finally apply that decorating wall sticker to our wall-wardrobe doors and the only thing I realised we were missing were those disposable blade cutting knifes to get rid off the excess sticker... We set out to some supermarket to buy those but behold, there were none. In a burst of brainstorming, we realised that we could probably get away with using DE razors for the job and went to the "shaving" section of the market to get a pack of DE razors. What a surprise for us when we found none - temporarily sold out. We were getting a bit desperate by this time, and I noticed there was a pack of Wilkinson DE razors in blister along with the plastic, basic Wilkinson DE razor. It cost "only" 4 more than the simple DE pack (that they didn't have) and we were already annoyed enough to just be happy grabbing that blister along with the razor and proceeding home.
Since I opened the blister and sat the razor aside, I was intrigued by it... It even came so far that before I knew it, I was scouting internet for tips and pros/cons to traditional wet shaving and seeing if it might be for me. The decorating wasn't even finished and I already decided to reserve at least 1 blade to try this style out. I am curious and playful thing by nature, so after watching some more youtube videos and reading more articles, I was already excited and decided I had to get out to the nearest open drugstore and get myself brush and cream. And I went.
After some searching, I found two brushes in the drugstore mark, one was supposedly badger, the other one some lower quality synthetic. I chose to go with the traditional badger, despite twice the cost (still cheap for 8 but hey, good enough for someone wanting to just try it, right?) and I after going through the foam/soap/cream section offering nothing but aerosol cans, I finally found Nivea shaving cream amongst after-shaves. Picturing myself preparing lather and lathering my face, I went home.
Of course, as soon as I got home, I just had to try it out. I unpacked my brush, "borrowed" a small desert bowl from kitchen (boy did I get a proper shouting at for that one), filled the sink with hot water, mounted blade into razor and went for shower.
After soaking my face with hot water in shower, I stood in front of the mirror and prepped myself for some interesting experience, maybe some cuts and curiously waiting how it will pan out. I took my brush and swept it in the water few times to get it wet, popped an almond-sized drop of cream into the bowl and got rid of excess water in my brush with few strokes. I started prepping my lather. And it felt good. After about 2 minutes of swirling and trying to get best lather in the world in my bowl, I decided that's about as good as it can get on first try and started lathering my face. It was fun. I absolutely enjoyed learning how to do the round, swirly motions (so alien to my hands used to merely smearing canned gel over my face and head) and I was excited about the sensation the lather, brush and the motions created on my face and neck. After about 3 minutes I was fairly happy with the application (although a bit scared that the layer of lather was somewhat slim - again, compared to the puffy can gels I had been using) but I decided to get on with it.
20 minutes later, after 3 goes, I had the smoothest shave I had in ages, and I felt really good about it. Yes, I got about 3 nicks from it, shaved only WTG and was clumsy at first, had a little bit burn on the right side of my neck (I place I used to have burns every time) - but I was very proud of myself at that point. I splashed my face with cold water, applied my aftershave balm and rinsed my equipment. I felt awesome.
Since then, I shaved for the fourth time today this morning and I am fairly sure this is the way of shaving I will be sticking with in the future. The whole process of prepping your face and lather, then lathering yourself to the shaving is just nice and relaxing for me. Since my first shave, I read some more and I tried soap as well as cream. I am not experimenting with some neck shaving techniques, tried the first XTG shave this morning and I have been told I smell different and nicer.
Apologies for the wall of text, but I just realised (after ordering new bunch of equipment today), that I actually do want to share this with people who went through the same or similar process as I had and understand me...
As for my new equipment, bound to arrive sometimes this or next week, I got (and will be very happy if you want to comment on the selection for beginner):
Merkur 47c razor - reasonably priced, Merkur has been suggested as go-to begginer razor by B&B and this one has longer handle, as I am rather big guy.
Durance L´ome alum block
On the whim, I purchased puck of each TOBS Grapefruit and Lime&Lemon cream respectively - very interested to hear what are people's experiences with these fragrances.
As for blades, I ordered Merkur Solingen Super platinum, Gillete Platinum, Derby Extra Double Edge and a sample pack containing Personna Platinum, Astra Platinum, Derby, Timor, Gillette 7 O'Clock Green, Gillette 7 O'Clock Yellow, Feather.
Going to stick with my budget brush at least for now until I get the grip of things.
just thought I'd share my excitement over wet shaving. For a bit of my personal shaving history, I had to start shaving around the age of 15 (mere 14 years ago by now) and at that time I believe Mach 3 was introduced to the market. As a kiddo that had no-one to teach him how to shave, I got a can of gillete foam, Mach 3 and some spare cartridges and had to make do.
I stuck with cartridge shaving for all those 14 years, trying different stuff until settiling for the vibrating Mach 3 and shaving gels from can, always viewing wet shaving as something only old farts did and not being worth the time - from which you can already sense that the whole shaving experience for me was not really nice and pleasant - burns, even nicks all the time, no matter what balm or treatment I used afterwards.
My love for cartridge shaving was furthermore reinforced in 2004, when I started to loose hair and decided to shave it off completely instead of trying to mask it - lucky for me I have very, very nice and round skull, so I kinda look badass since then
But hey, cartridge shavers (M3) was the best to get the job done effectively, the only thing I really dreaded was the consumable cost - if I didn't shave every day and shaved (the head especially) only every other day, it was very usual to dull the cartridge in 2 shaves, even the second face shave usually was harder. Somewhat I begrugingly stuck with this way of shaving until this weekend...This weekend, me and my girlfriend decided to finally apply that decorating wall sticker to our wall-wardrobe doors and the only thing I realised we were missing were those disposable blade cutting knifes to get rid off the excess sticker... We set out to some supermarket to buy those but behold, there were none. In a burst of brainstorming, we realised that we could probably get away with using DE razors for the job and went to the "shaving" section of the market to get a pack of DE razors. What a surprise for us when we found none - temporarily sold out. We were getting a bit desperate by this time, and I noticed there was a pack of Wilkinson DE razors in blister along with the plastic, basic Wilkinson DE razor. It cost "only" 4 more than the simple DE pack (that they didn't have) and we were already annoyed enough to just be happy grabbing that blister along with the razor and proceeding home.
Since I opened the blister and sat the razor aside, I was intrigued by it... It even came so far that before I knew it, I was scouting internet for tips and pros/cons to traditional wet shaving and seeing if it might be for me. The decorating wasn't even finished and I already decided to reserve at least 1 blade to try this style out. I am curious and playful thing by nature, so after watching some more youtube videos and reading more articles, I was already excited and decided I had to get out to the nearest open drugstore and get myself brush and cream. And I went.
After some searching, I found two brushes in the drugstore mark, one was supposedly badger, the other one some lower quality synthetic. I chose to go with the traditional badger, despite twice the cost (still cheap for 8 but hey, good enough for someone wanting to just try it, right?) and I after going through the foam/soap/cream section offering nothing but aerosol cans, I finally found Nivea shaving cream amongst after-shaves. Picturing myself preparing lather and lathering my face, I went home.
Of course, as soon as I got home, I just had to try it out. I unpacked my brush, "borrowed" a small desert bowl from kitchen (boy did I get a proper shouting at for that one), filled the sink with hot water, mounted blade into razor and went for shower.
After soaking my face with hot water in shower, I stood in front of the mirror and prepped myself for some interesting experience, maybe some cuts and curiously waiting how it will pan out. I took my brush and swept it in the water few times to get it wet, popped an almond-sized drop of cream into the bowl and got rid of excess water in my brush with few strokes. I started prepping my lather. And it felt good. After about 2 minutes of swirling and trying to get best lather in the world in my bowl, I decided that's about as good as it can get on first try and started lathering my face. It was fun. I absolutely enjoyed learning how to do the round, swirly motions (so alien to my hands used to merely smearing canned gel over my face and head) and I was excited about the sensation the lather, brush and the motions created on my face and neck. After about 3 minutes I was fairly happy with the application (although a bit scared that the layer of lather was somewhat slim - again, compared to the puffy can gels I had been using) but I decided to get on with it.
20 minutes later, after 3 goes, I had the smoothest shave I had in ages, and I felt really good about it. Yes, I got about 3 nicks from it, shaved only WTG and was clumsy at first, had a little bit burn on the right side of my neck (I place I used to have burns every time) - but I was very proud of myself at that point. I splashed my face with cold water, applied my aftershave balm and rinsed my equipment. I felt awesome.
Since then, I shaved for the fourth time today this morning and I am fairly sure this is the way of shaving I will be sticking with in the future. The whole process of prepping your face and lather, then lathering yourself to the shaving is just nice and relaxing for me. Since my first shave, I read some more and I tried soap as well as cream. I am not experimenting with some neck shaving techniques, tried the first XTG shave this morning and I have been told I smell different and nicer.
Apologies for the wall of text, but I just realised (after ordering new bunch of equipment today), that I actually do want to share this with people who went through the same or similar process as I had and understand me...
As for my new equipment, bound to arrive sometimes this or next week, I got (and will be very happy if you want to comment on the selection for beginner):
Merkur 47c razor - reasonably priced, Merkur has been suggested as go-to begginer razor by B&B and this one has longer handle, as I am rather big guy.
Durance L´ome alum block
On the whim, I purchased puck of each TOBS Grapefruit and Lime&Lemon cream respectively - very interested to hear what are people's experiences with these fragrances.
As for blades, I ordered Merkur Solingen Super platinum, Gillete Platinum, Derby Extra Double Edge and a sample pack containing Personna Platinum, Astra Platinum, Derby, Timor, Gillette 7 O'Clock Green, Gillette 7 O'Clock Yellow, Feather.
Going to stick with my budget brush at least for now until I get the grip of things.
