So yesterdays shave left a lot to be desired...
Lather was Simpson Special (pure badger) and La Toja stick, and shaved with a Merkur Futur (setting 2) and 2nd use Wizamet blade. Normally this setup works well for me but for some reason nothing was working yesterday.
First pass WTG was fine, second pass XTG yielded some mild irritation (to be fair I should have stopped here), but the 3rd pass left me with several bleeding cuts and more severe irritation.
Aftershave was alum block (very painful!) followed by Nivea sensitive balm but my skin still showed multiple red patches which I haven't got since my Mach 3 days.
Fast forward to this mornings shave and totally different ball game. I changed things up a bit by fisrtly using proraso pre-shave, followed by a softer brush - Edwin Jagger (best badger) and Cella soap lathered in a Q-Shave scuttle. I still had irritation from yesterdays shave but the minute the proraso and lather went on this practically disappeared. I think the combination of a mentholated pre-shave plus a heated lather balanced out and cancelled the irritation, or at least 'numbed' it.
I was going to ditch the Futur and try something far milder (like a Feather Popular), but my scientific nature wanted to experiment by seeing if the blade was the culprit. Spoiler alert, it wasn't! I only did 2 passes today with the Futur (settings 1 and 2 respectively) and no irritation whatsoever!
My skin felt so good after the shave that I almost didn't feel the alum. Because of this, I skipped the Nivea and went straight to Floid aftershave, really nice!
Now, sitting here about an hour post shave and still no issues to speak of! Weird how a shave can vary from day to day with only minor changes of equipment!
Lather was Simpson Special (pure badger) and La Toja stick, and shaved with a Merkur Futur (setting 2) and 2nd use Wizamet blade. Normally this setup works well for me but for some reason nothing was working yesterday.
First pass WTG was fine, second pass XTG yielded some mild irritation (to be fair I should have stopped here), but the 3rd pass left me with several bleeding cuts and more severe irritation.
Aftershave was alum block (very painful!) followed by Nivea sensitive balm but my skin still showed multiple red patches which I haven't got since my Mach 3 days.
Fast forward to this mornings shave and totally different ball game. I changed things up a bit by fisrtly using proraso pre-shave, followed by a softer brush - Edwin Jagger (best badger) and Cella soap lathered in a Q-Shave scuttle. I still had irritation from yesterdays shave but the minute the proraso and lather went on this practically disappeared. I think the combination of a mentholated pre-shave plus a heated lather balanced out and cancelled the irritation, or at least 'numbed' it.
I was going to ditch the Futur and try something far milder (like a Feather Popular), but my scientific nature wanted to experiment by seeing if the blade was the culprit. Spoiler alert, it wasn't! I only did 2 passes today with the Futur (settings 1 and 2 respectively) and no irritation whatsoever!
My skin felt so good after the shave that I almost didn't feel the alum. Because of this, I skipped the Nivea and went straight to Floid aftershave, really nice!
Now, sitting here about an hour post shave and still no issues to speak of! Weird how a shave can vary from day to day with only minor changes of equipment!
