I have been watching and reading for a bit now and I thought I would introduce myself. My name is mikewood and I have been shaving for about two months and have been buying the odd razor from the bay, soap or brush and enjoying the process of learning wet shaving. My first purchase was a bluebeard scimitar which is a wonderful razor with a cool skull and X-bones. I bought a used badger brush and was gifted with a few Sterling soaps. Then I got a superspeed, and an adjustable and a straight. I figured out the SS was a bit small and I need some down time to really figure out the straight. The Gillette adjustable is awesome and I use it daily. I like Astra SP blades and I am bowl lathering with a salsa bowl, and my hand made ceramic lather bowl. Aftershave has been Bruit splash on or hits from a captains choice sampler pack. I need a good bay rum aftershave. I realize I still have a lot to learn but I have been getting acceptable shaves from day one and good shaves after the first month. It's all been great fun and I appreciate you letting me be a part of your community. mw
Greetings Mike! Welcome to The Shave Den. Good to have you with us. You can learn a lot here. Enjoy the ride.
Since you are new to the Double Edge world, here is the advice I received when I started with a DE and so I freely give it to new users. The most important things in shaving are, your skin and technique. All other things fall in line behind those two things and to support them. Since the skin is a given fixed item, the next major item is technique. It is called THE 30 DAY RULE. THE 30 DAY RULE is as follows: Find a razor, then a blade that will not cause issues with your skin (that may take a few different blades in a sampler pack to find a suitable choice or it maybe the first out of the gate) and select a soap or cream that is easy to generate good lather. Once you find those, and it may take a couple of weeks to find this combination, order a quantity of that blade enough for 30 days, and then spend 30 days using nothing else until you build up your technique. (Note that only one brand blade is used for 30 days after each blade in the sampler pack is tested to make the decision on the blade brand to use for 30 days.) The 30 day clock starts when you have the right blade for you. After 30 days, change one and only one variable and work for another week then change another after another week. At that point you should be able to make better decisions because your technique is now in place. This will help you to avoid buying too much gear and stuff too soon without having the technique down to enjoy it all. This really does work. Oh and one more thing ... Welcome to the Den. We know you'll fit right in. So grab yourself a comfy chair, and give our threads a spin! Burma Shave
Thank you For the welcome. It looks like I will have my work cut out for myself to make 15 quality posts by tomorrow's deadline per rule #3 but I will do my best!
to TSD "mikewood" Nice collection of razors you have there. A good Bay Rum you might want to check out is Clubman Virgin Island Bay Rum. Smells nice and last a pretty long time for a Bay Rum. Be warned though if you've had a rough shave the VI bay rum will burn like hell fire..
