Six in a Sample Box

Discussion in 'Shave Soaps' started by Joe Nobles, Aug 14, 2018.

  1. Joe Nobles

    Joe Nobles Well-Known Member

    Hello all,
    Back in the tail end of June I ordered a variety package of Russian shaving creams, well they finely arrived! The package contains six different creams. They are Мыльный/Soapy, Яблоневый цвет/Apple Blossom, викинг/Viking, Старт/Start, Знахарь/Wizard and ТимБри/TimBreeze (timber and breeze combined). The whole package cost $15 from a vendor on eBay, no shipping was charged.

    As I go through them I will review each, and today I will review the first one I choose to use.

    The first one I choose was Яблоневый цвет/Apple Blossom, I picked this one first because it was the whole reason I ordered the sampler in the first place. I initially saw this cream on voskhod.eu but it was sold out.

    As with all of the Russian creams this one comes in a tube (this one contains 40g). The directions say to apply a 2-3cm dollop onto a brush that has been moistened with warm water and work up a lather on your face, then shave. This cream along with Мыльный/Soapy and Старт/Start are made by Svoboda. Яблоневый цвет/Apple Blossom claims to be for sensitive skin (my type)

    This stuff smells great! It saddens me to say that my results were not that good. I used my best set-up for a razor (my Gillette Ball-End Tech and a Rapira Platinum Lux blade). The directions say to apply a 2-3cm dollop onto a brush that has been moistened with warm water and work up a lather on your face, then shave. The lather was good as to quantity but I had no glide and no lift (I have a medium coarse beard but only had a days worth of stubble on my face). So my shave was not that good, usually with this set-up I get a BBS in one pass using one of my 3 go-to soaps (Williams Mug, Stirling Gentleman or VDH luxury). With this soap even 3 passes weren't enough to get all the stubble off especially on the area under my chin and on my Adams Apple area. So we won't be buying this one again! However perhaps I need practice with lathering on my face, since I've got 40g I might play with it some more.

    Next shave will be with викинг/Viking ('cause it is such a great name). The instructions are similar. So keep tuned in.
     
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  2. dmshaver

    dmshaver Well-Known Member

    Interesting post. I don’t have any experience with Russian creams or soaps, so I’ll be following this thread.
     
  3. wristwatchb

    wristwatchb wristwatch "danger" b

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  4. NCoxSTL

    NCoxSTL AAACK!

    I ordered a set of 5 and of that 5 - only one was actually a shaving cream. The rest were after shaves. Start is the only Russian shaving cream I've ever had that worked. And it works well. I'll keep an eye out for how you make out with these.
     
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  5. Joe Nobles

    Joe Nobles Well-Known Member

    @NCoxSTL The thing to look for on the label is "крем для бритья" Russian for "cream for shaving".
     
    Last edited: Aug 15, 2018
    NCoxSTL likes this.
  6. poppi

    poppi Well-Known Member

    Interesting fer sure.
     
  7. stingraysrock

    stingraysrock PIF'd away his custom title

    I tried the apple blossom once and it had a whang of diesel fuel to it. Does yours smell like pure apple?
     
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  8. NCoxSTL

    NCoxSTL AAACK!

    Diesel fuel, a little old cooking oil, leftovers from Chernobyl - it's all good. Just Soviet level engineering at its finest.
     
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  9. dmshaver

    dmshaver Well-Known Member

    Don’t light a match!:)
     
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  10. Joe Nobles

    Joe Nobles Well-Known Member

    Apple blossom, to me, is like warm spiced Apple cider. It is a very nice fragrance. Just not a good soap for shaving. Now Viking is a little better, it has a very nice citrus scent it lathers a bit thin and doesn't give you a much in the way of slickness either it just sits there as a some what adequate foam.

    I have a feeling that is how the remainder of the soap in the package are going to behave. So I am kinda disappointed in what I got in the way of performance but if the Russians have aftershave balms with fragrances as nice, that feel good I'm all in, because these smell really nice.
     
  11. Joe Nobles

    Joe Nobles Well-Known Member

    To keep you all informed the shave with Viking shaving cream from a tube I did this one with my Shick Injector E 2. I really think Shave soap from a tube is just not a good idea, how do any of you guys that use domestically produced tubed soaps compare them to pucks and why do you like tubed soaps better?

    'Cause so far I ain't liking what I'm seein' with these Russian concoctions!
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2018
  12. Joe Nobles

    Joe Nobles Well-Known Member

    Well Guys, I did some digging and found that the problem with the creams was operator error. I was not using the correct amount of cream I had the ratio of cream to water wrong and my water was not hot enough. With all these items ironed out I got a great shave with Яблоневый цвет/Apple Blossom and expect to get just as good a shave from викинг/Viking.
     
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