Artha Shaving Soap Review

Discussion in 'Shave Soaps' started by Shaver X, Jan 20, 2015.

  1. Shaver X

    Shaver X Well-Known Member

    Artha Shaving Soap Review

    I happened upon the Artha Soaps website when doing an unrelated search on Google. Could this be serendipity at work? They do make a shaving soap after all. Artha hemp soaps have been around for a long time, since 1993. They must be doing something right to remain in business that long. I had excellent results with Kell's Original, another soap with hemp oil, and so decided to giver Artha's soap a try.

    Artha Handmade Hemp Soaps website: www.arthasoaps.com


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    The soap pucks are quite small, but you get two of them for $6.

    Overall: (6.3/10)

    The soapmaker at Artha obviously puts a lot of care into the products, and it shows in their shaving soap. The shaving soap is outstanding in all respects except one: lather longevity. It excels in every other category, however. So much so that I kept using the soap for an entire week despite that fact that the lather is short lived. The skincare and scent are that good. It really is an amazing soap in many ways. Unfortunately, the very poor lather longevity is a deal killer.

    Ease of lathering: (9/10)

    This soap lathers very readily with both the badger and boar brushes, and a great deal of lather can be quickly whipped up with little effort. It is marginally easier to lather this soap with the boar brush, though. The resulting lather quality was the same with both brushes. The resulting lather is somewhat light and airy, as can be seen in the photo. This soap works best with more water than usual in the brush. Skimping on the water made generating a lather much more difficult, and the resulting lather was not as good as when more water was used.

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    Life span of lather: (4/10)

    That lather starts to dissapear almost immediately after being applied to my face. It leaves behind a transparent lubricating film where the lather dissapears. This soap is better than some other artisan soaps in this regard, but it is still a major annoyance and this soap's Achilles heel. It is often necessary to re-lather once during a given shave pass, and sometimes twice. The lather does not last very long in the brush, so a fresh lather must be generated on it too from time to time. It is possible to shave if one does so fairly quickly. Having to rush largely takes the fun out of the shave, though.

    General skincare: (10/10)

    The skincare from Artha shaving soap is amazingly good! There is no need to use aftershave balm when using this soap. It leaves my face feeling so good all day long, and is very moisturizing. There is no greasiness about it at all, a very welcome characteristic. The skincare is even better than the excellent Kiss My Face shaving cream, and that is saying a lot.

    Lubrication: (10/10)

    The soap is super slick, more so than most shaving soaps. The razor glides over my face without any tugging or pulling in the slightest. This slickness might be why the shaves can be so very smooth with this soap.

    How protective: (7/10)

    I got no nicks or cuts when using Artha soap, but there was a little irritation. This was very minor with a three-pass shave, but still enough so that using aftershave or an alum block stung a bit. Using more passes resulted in more noticeable irritation, although with a nearly baby bottom smooth shave. The irritation did not last all that long, maybe 20 minutes at most. The smooth shaves were almost worth it, however.

    Scent: (10/10)

    The frankincense scent is divine, the very best I have ever encountered in a shaving soap. To my nose, it is a wonderful citrusy, earthy smell. The printed note that came with the soaps said it is made "with Frankincense powder". Whatever they used, it is done to perfection. Did I mention the scent is awesome?

    Price: (8/10)

    The price is $6.00 for two 1.3 ounce (37 grams) soap cakes. It seems like a good deal to me. A scented sachet in a cloth bag was even included, a nice touch.

    Would you buy again: (5/10)

    The short lather lifespan makes this a challenging soap to use, and is reason enough not to buy it again. Regardless, the slickness, the outstanding skincare, and the mind-blowingly good scent kept me using it for a week. Most other soaps that lathered that poorly were sent to the shower after the first two or three shaves. I think I will use the Artha soap in the shower, where it excels in all respects. As for the Artha bath soaps, I will most certainly be buying some in the future, occasionally for my own use, but especially for gifts. Now if Artha gets the lather thing fixed on the shaving soaps, I will buy them on an ongoing basis, as they would then be the Eighth Shaving Wonder of the World.

    Shaving cream ingredients:

    There were no ingredients labels on the soaps, but this was on a slip of paper that came in the shipment:

    Organic hemp seed oil, Coconut oil, California olive oil, California rainwater, and essential oils

    Brushes used:

    Dovo 918052 pure badger
    Omega 50014 boar travel brush

    Note that although the Dovo brush is sold as a pure badger, the brush characteristics and cost indicate that it is actually a better grade than pure.

    My water hardness:

    53 ppm as CaCO3 (soft)

    The water hardness was taken from my utility's latest water quality annual report. The scale below was used to correlate water ppm to the soft/hard rating, and is from the

    US Geological Survey website.

    Water hardness scale (as CaCO3):

    0-60 mg/l: Soft
    61-120 mg/l: Moderately hard
    121-180 mg/l: Hard
    Over 180 mg/l: Very hard

    mg/l is milligrams per liter
    Some utilities give water hardness in parts per million (ppm)
    1 mg/l = 1 ppm (not exactly, but very, very close)
     
    Last edited: May 12, 2018
  2. RaZorBurn123

    RaZorBurn123 waiting hardily...............

    Interesting. Thank you for writing this review. :happy088:
     
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  3. GDCarrington

    GDCarrington Burma Shave

    Excellent review!
     
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  4. celestino

    celestino Friendly Neighborhood Wetshaver

    Thanks for the review! That is a very simple list of ingredients, but nothing to really bind the lather from what I understand. At least, it will work in the shower and you have a great smelling soap! :)
     
    Shaver X likes this.
  5. Jostalli

    Jostalli Well-Known Member

    Great review - nice to learn about other soaps.
     
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  6. Omelmad

    Omelmad My printer email address is..........

    Thank you for the review. That's to bad about the lather. Seems like a good product despite that. You can always use it with a booster. A scentless cream or soap., that way you get all the good qualities of the artha shaving soap and a lather that is like kiss my face
     
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  7. Shaver X

    Shaver X Well-Known Member

    I tried that this morning, to no great effect. I put an almond-size amount of Kiss My Face unscented in the mug on top of the Artha soap. The result was like a slightly sub-par version of a Kiss My Face lather, one that started to disappear a little soon after it was applied. The great scent was still there, albeit more faint. IMHO, it would have been better to use the Kiss My Face by itself. Not to mention that my take is that a soap or cream should work well on its own, and not require a "superlather".
     
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  8. Omelmad

    Omelmad My printer email address is..........

    I guess it was worth a try haha. I feel the same way. A lather shouldn't dissipate, especially when you have tried to boost it
     

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