The Artist Method

I'm a new reader here, but I've been aware of the flavor of the soap business for about a year. When I saw the post, "Use Ivory Soap," detailing Procter-Gamble's shaving instructions from 1911, it inspired a week of bathroom research (partially documented at "Classic Shaving" on G+) resulting in the following grand synthesis, quote:

1. Take a bar of Ivory (or, probably, any other "real" soap) and immerse it in a basin of water with your non-dominant hand. When it stops dripping through your fingers, load a concentrated solution of the liquid crystalline soap from the surface of the puck onto the brush WITHOUT LATHERING, as if it were watercolor paint. Repeat until brush is fully charged.

2. Set brush aside. Rinse and dry hands with cloth. Put a pinch of BAKING SODA and a dime-sized pool of canola OIL in the non-dominant palm. Got some Bentonite CLAY? Essential oil, whether for health or pleasure? Now's the time.

3. Build lather in palm. Dip brush tips in basin to add water until hydration is correct.

IT'S POOR-MAN'S METHOD SHAVING. I shall dub it, Launder-shaving... lol, no. The Artist Method, in reference to the great capitalists who inspired it.

If it works for you, then congratulations! Personally, I enjoy the magnificent scents I can get from all of the artisanal soaps.

What I've suggested favors the local artisan who has not the experience base to produce soap specialized for shaving. They can handle the "soap" and the "scent" parts (hopefully, including some awareness of allergic sensitivities), we can control the oil, water, clay ourselves. On the other hand, a low-cost, personally customized baseline experience should raise expectations of specialized products, bringing some economic justice to the top shelf also.

Speaking of water, it is important to note that one will have to control water hardness, which will be listed as Step 1 of The Artist Method henceforth. I put a little vinegar in my palm, as if to use as splash, then run my hand under the faucet as the basin fills to a depth of an inch or two. With that taken care of, I could actually face lather comfortably.

Now that I've discovered for myself the wet-brush (Marco) method, I realize a brush fully charged with Ivory is way too much soap. I was willing to accept something so cheap as being a little harsh. But today I got the same sensation from a soap I know to be exceptionally gentle, Stirling, and traced it back to overloading in the wet brush method.

So I'm exploring two options. One, squeeze the "cream" from the above method into a mug, let it dry, then work the resulting concrete with a wet brush.

Result was a thin foam that tends to dissipate, but has plenty of moisture and residual slickness, and isn't too harsh. If the shave were irritation-free, the way it foamed out into something resembling bath bubbles would suggest comparison to Cremo (latherless) cream, based on reviews. But I clearly went too deep for what I was working with, leaving me a bit sore and unable to start faceturbating until my beard re-emerged. Conclusion: not worth the trouble.

Two, determining a way to measure soap sufficient for a single bowl of lather and carefully pre-mix it with a brushload of water. One "dip" of the bar, for example, followed by dry loading, then gentle immersion of the brush. Stay tuned.

Most Marco method videos show people sloshing away water and bearing down on the brush eventually. Other people have formalized this into a more specific method where a wet brush is used to dissolve soap into solution, then that is squeezed into a bowl and the dry brush loaded further. Then the liquid is used to lather the cream.

The Ivory bar is very amenable to this. Immersing once, a wet brush dissolves from one side of the bar, is squeezed into a mug (a bowl being too fancy for Ivory), and the slime cleaned off the entire bar with the dry brush.

I still found it a little too harsh to make a habit of it, but as with the dry brush method alone, tolerable for 3 passes and more, good for a BBS shave. I think it took less soap, too.

So you've been doing this for a while now. Knowing there are a plethora of commercial and artisan soaps out there made for shaving (and seemingly another pops up every day), many at a reasonable price, would you still recommend experimenting with ivory? You mention you receive a tolerable 3 pass shave...is there enough financial savings to justify have a tolerable shave?

No, Ivory is definitely not for me. I will continue experimenting with other soaps, though.

I think any soap that you have to add anything to then defeats the object some what. You might be able to take a normal soap and shave with it, but only after adding a load of stuff. It's not really shaving with a bath soap, but shaving with a bath soap plus a load of other stuff

If you have an oil blend that particularly suits you, a certain mineral content in the water, glycerine intolerance... it's a way to find out. Trial and error isn't too efficient, either. I "burned" through 4 unsatisfactory soap products before finding Stirling.

Thad - for anywhere from 6-10 US you can get a bar of milled shaving soap - designed for our needs - that could last 2 months+. I have a cylinder of Arko ( cost me 3-4 bucks ) that already has 60+ shaves on it, and there's still more left...

I used to shave with regular soap - long ago - a good artisanal soap is literally heaven!

Happy New Year!

The distribution of shaving soap (and other shaving goods) by mail fosters price jacking and poor quality. "But it's a half a pound of soap," they say... if it doesn't work, or you can't stand the smell, that's no bargain.

You buy a puck of Williams at the drugstore, burn your face off, you're out a dollar -- fair enough. We need more options in that channel.

Otherwise, I agree. I sell the soaps I've found don't burn my sensitive skin, and lather well in the local hard water, at flea markets. Now offering Arko!

NEW AND IMPROVED! After watching barber videos where shaving oil was worked into an emulsion, I arrived at the following.

1. Treat hard water in basin with a splash of vinegar
2. Apply 3-5 drops shaving oil without washing (unless you're dirty)
3. Dissolve a pinch of baking soda in a small splash of water in your palm, then mix with the oil, forming an exfoliating and hydrating emulsion.
4. Apply wet brush to bar soap and work up lather as desired, face or palm.
5. Shave immediately after lather is applied.

A "tolerable shave"??? That is the bar now?

Think i'll just stick to my CRSW stash....

SteveWY said:

A "tolerable shave"??? That is the bar now?

Click to expand...

One source of my curiosity was to understand my father better: shaved with Ivory in the shower with a cartridge -- or nothing! Father-in-law, similar story. It was practically inconceivable to me, with "sensitive skin" and wiry beard. But, even I have managed to skew my techniques to get a good shave with less than ideal soap, ON OCCASION. It's not for your three-pass, leisurely luxury shave, that's for sure. And sometimes I just feel like going dry. I don't know why. (I swallowed a fly?)