Which TI razor for a beginer

[professorchaos]

[EDIT
I read somewhere that the Historic series of razors are produced by their most skilled craftsmen. Cannot attest to whether or not that is true. Only that every one of my six Historic razors is exceedingly well done while one of my two new production razors is well done. Care to guess which one is poorly finished? Is it the moderately priced (when I bought it) Evide Sonnant Extra or the 7/8 "Loup et Bellier" in blonde horn which cost three times more?

As an aside, I haven't bought a TI for quite some time. How much they cost now is, frankly, astonishing. They were not exactly cheap when I acquired SRAD either. Another argument in favor of vintage blades: $339.99 for a new production 7/8 in Olive wood or just about any razor that crops up on Ebay. The TIs are handsome razors indeed, but I have picked up many phenomenal, unique blades off of EBay for half the price. YMMV.

 

[Hyperborean]

If I didn't already read something similar a few days ago I would have said that Evide Sonant had poorer finish than Loup et Belier but I guess it's the other way around.

Gugi, you seem to defend contemporary razor manufacturers strongly...again I don't agree with that argument...if they are not as good as making razors as they used to be and thus have high amount of reject that is their fault, they shouldn't roll over these costs to consumer...it's like they charge the customer for their incapability to produce razors efficiently ...goddamn don't they have some mean work supervisor there

regarding the 5 $ cartridge route, I guess you can buy for a lifetime of cartridges for a cost of a couple of expensive razors, the cost of strops and sharpening/honing stones...anyway that's not valid reason why would one want a straight razor

I think the problem is that there are only a few manufacturers left, so the supply of razors is quite rigid,there is also lack of competition to keep the prices more or less reasonable or to force the manufacturer to apply more stringent standards of quality plus the fact that you can usually only buy them via internet and yoru can't inspect razor before buying...