Great weekend shave, Gary!

Also a great example of a "basic gear" shave -- simple, non-adjustable, inexpensive vintage razor paired with a basic boar brush lathering up an inexpensive commercial soap and finishing with a commercial splash.

Great shaving setup, Joe! That is a striking handle on that Jayaruh boar brush. Alternating bands of maple and walnut wood perhaps?

I like the cocobolo scales on that razor, Joe. I am a sucker for nice woods.

Saturday January 11 (evening) - Just Gillette, Jeeves and Jayaruh/Jason January

Prep: Hot face wash with Aleppo olive oil soap w/ 20% bay laurel oil (traditional anti-acne)

Razor: English-made Gillette Aristocrat Jr. / PolSilver Super Iridium (2)

Soap: Jeeves of Hudson Street Turkish Bath (later renamed "Barbershop")

Brush: Jason's 30DC LE maple cashmere

Lather Bowl: None

Post: rinse, alum, rinse, styptic pencil, Jeeves of Hudson Street Barbershop splash

Last shave: Wednesday morning - 3.5 days ago

The razors, soaps and splashes for the month:



Today's setup:




I originally didn't intend to shave today, but after reading everybody else's posts and doing some razor research, I gave in and did.

I simply repeated my setup from my last shave.

This time, I left the synthetic brush wetter and loaded "heavy" in the tub of old Jeeves soap, doing about 30 swirls instead of my usual 6 to 10. The difference was obvious -- much thicker lather and enough in the brush for about three passes instead of barely enough for two.

Still almost no scent though...

My usual two passes - WTG and then XTG - returned me to a cleanshaven DFS.

Despite the better lather, I managed to nick myself in the left upper lip on my first pass. Blood was clearly visible and continued after the rinse, second pass with fresh lather, rinse, alum and rinse. I had to break out the styptic pencil to stop it.

Examining it, it looked like two small nicks about 1/16" apart. I think I must not have stretched the skin tightly enough there and ended up catching a tiny "fold". The heavy "nick proof" injector I have used for the past year would have simply flattened it with its weight and ridden over any remaining wrinkle; the lighter and more aggressive DE is less forgiving. Clearly I have become a bit sloppy this past year and will have to correct the errors that have crept into my technique. I am also clearly not yet ready to dive back into using a razor like an open comb Gillette Old Type or my Fatip Grande...

Aside from stinging on the nick, the alum bar was silent.

The splash again made up for the soap's loss of scent. And its combination of alcohol and menthol provided a pleasant burn to finish.

Overall a good shave despite the one error

Hope everyone is having a good weekend so far.

Thanks John. It was why I bought it. I wanted a straight with wooden scales and since it was made by the famous Ralf Aust; I was sold. I bought it used, but it shaves well. I bought my other Aust new from Maggards, but it has the black acrylic scales.

Despite the boo-boo, you had a nice shave John. Love the setup.

very true about the 34c..most popular in Europe i imagine up ntil the 1990s,when the world opened up via the internet.then sales in the western world really started ...gillettes also differed design wise in different countries up until 1950 0r so,when the U.S designed models became standard fare.

thank you John...i could use this set up for the rest of time,simple and inexpensive,but rivals many top shelf items..

fantastic 'crat jr shave and pic John.cool razors.

Thx Gary

Phew! A real beauty. Gotta shave with it though!

Thanks, Gary! The English Aristocrat Jr is a nice, solid little TTO.

Interesting stuff here. Ironically, I was watching a Shave Nation video earlier where Geofatboy said ChatGPT also named the Merkur 34c as the most popular razor when he asked it that question. I double checked his result and had the same. However, when I went to CoPilot, which is Microsoft's AI, it named the King C. Gillette Safety Razor as "one of the most popular" safety razors. It then mentioned the Rockwell 6S next. I guess we can't even get AI to agree on razor questions. I suspect, however, that the algorithms are different.

Ok, not to muddy the waters, but I decided to ask each AI what was the most popular VINTAGE Gillette safety razor. CoPilot named the Super Speed. ChatGPC named the Fatboy. It would seem that artificial intelligence is about as opinionated as shaving enthusiast intelligence. We're on a roll. So, one more question to each......what was the most sold vintage safety razor? ChatGPC named both the Tech and Super Speed. CoPilot named the Gillette Double Ring. I give up.

January 11, 2025

Jillette January

Razor - 1957 (C2) Gillette Super Speed Blue Tip
Blade -
Soap - Mitchell's Wool Fat
Brush - @jtspartan handle with synthetic fan knot
Finish - Lilac Vegetal

Well, as @ChrisB said, this new Blue Tip, no matter how pristine it is, must be shaved with. So, tonight was the night. Backing up to 1957 this is the lightest and mildest Super Speed made. And, when I began my shave, I couldn't believe how mild it felt. It was like the blade wasn't even in the razor. Seriously. It was that smooth. No drag, no noise, no feel of........oh wait.......NO BLADE. Ooops. Forget to put it in. Ok. Backing up one step there, I put a Gillette 7 O'clock Super Platinum in and started over. Ah, there we go. Definitely smooth and mild. Great feel to the shave and I worked two full passes, followed by quite a bit of touch up. Great feeling shave, but the finish was a bit less than I usually get. I will admit that mild razors and I don't get along the best, as I prefer aggressive beasts. I can say, however, that for the way this razor is designed it did a fantastic job. One more full pass and I would have been where I normally am.

I paired my big fan synthetic with the Fat to get a great and luxurious lather which made the whole experience that much more enjoyable. Glad I picked this one up. Rare to see a Blue Tip with the tip actually in original paint and without damage as well. This one is going back in its case and on display. At some point I'll be pulling it out to do comparisons with all of the Super Speeds.

The Mighty Veg for the final win of the day! Life is good. Snow is melting slowly. You gents enjoy the rest of your weekend.

​

techs and flaretips were mass produced in the millions..i guess AI needs to read the production numbers..

cool bluetip shave and pic Neal.

I haven't really settled on a provable answer to the question, but I do agree that those two especially were mass produced and marketed. There were also earlier versions of the Super Speed that could count as well I suppose. One safe answer to what is the longest continuously manufactured line of safety razor would simply be to say....."Gillette".

However, let's go to ChatGPT and some dating charts to see if we can determine a winner between Techs and Super Speeds. Both the AI and the dating chart agree that Techs were produced from 1938 through 1979. That's 42 years of production. That's a long time. Super Speeds came along officially in 1947 and ended production in 1988. That's 42 years of production. That's a long time, but the exact same number of years Techs were produced. So, based on that we can say that Techs and Super Speeds are the longest continually manufactured vintage razors. To determine a true winner we would have to find production numbers, and I'm not sure those exist anywhere outside of Gillette archives at this point.

i thought i had read/seen some figures somewhere,b and b maybe from one of the gillette gurus..razor emporium maybe..,gave highest to lowest product years and figures..

Fantastic! Well done, nice to see it being used, but it definitely needs to be parked, admired and brought out for special ocsasions

Beautiful photo; entertaining shave report.

I usually catch things like lack of a blade now because I double-check that TTO doors are locked down tight and 2- or 3- piece razors are solidly screwed together before every shave. Result of unfortunate experiences where I didn't and they weren't...

The worst was with one of those early Gem/Everyready flip-lid razors that hold the Gem single-edge blades in place by simple spring friction pressure. I grabbed it out of the rack and started shaving without noticing that the blade had been jostled and one edge had slipped out past the corner retaining notch so the end protuded by about a millimeter. My first two strokes gouged parallel furrows down my cheek. I spent a week looking like I had Heidelberg sabre duelling scars on my face. That's the sort of lesson you tend to remember.

Interesting! And it highlights two of the problem with the AIs: 1. The answer you get depends on the exact wording of the question you ask - and how the AI interprets those words; and 2. lack of citations to original sources to show the evidence the AI is basing the answer on.

Regarding your first post, Neal, I think the King C. Gillette Safety Razor is produced in India and also sold there. If it's sold there, then given the size of the Indian safety razor market, it quite possibly is one of the most popular safety razors worldwide. The Rockwell 6S????? Not a chance! Not even just in North America.

(This also demonstrates the Western bias: given the size of the Indian and Chinese markets, the DE razors sold in the highest quantities worldwide are undoubtedly some Chinese and Indian domestic brands that we have possibly never even heard of.)

As between the Tech and the SuperSpeed, I suspect the answer for "most produced" would be the Tech. It was simpler and probably cheaper and easier to manufacture. But the biggest reason: Unlike the SuperSpeed, the Tech was produced during WW2 and then was produced alongside the SuperSpeed throughout the Korean War, Vietnam War and most of the Cold War eras. That's millions of military contract razors -- and certainly ALL of the WW2 ones would have been Techs.