I haven't tried Hand-made shaving creams and soaps but a good commercial one that I like a lot is Taylor of Old Bond Street. I like the Sandalwood one but there are many to choose from. Very creamy, lathers tremendously and you use very little.
tobs is a favorite for many , including myself..saponificio bignoli is a great italian artisan cream as well..
As far as the Cremo debate. After speaking with the company first hand here is the scoop. The first batch was a complete and utter failure. It was known too late to pull the product, so, they ate the loss and reformulated the new batch. I have both, and soon, will do a video showing the before product and the after product. The new batch should be on the shelves now, and WILL lather. That's the skinny on that. As far as handmade goes, Phoenix Artisan Accoutrements is a great one as well as Stirling.
I haven't tried PAA but I agree Stirling is awesome. But it should be known that Stirling only makes soaps, not creams. And from looking at PAA's website it seems that their branded stuff is just soap. And the stuff they made for others like WCS are also soaps. The OP was looking for creams. Like others have said I like the Taylor of Old Bond Street creams and have several. I'm not a real big fan of Proraso creams but I love Musgo Real creams. I have a couple of Castle Forbes creams, Lavender and Lime, and I've been a little disappointed in them given all they hype they get and how expensive it is. I'm not sure if any of those I've mentioned qualify as "artisan" and haven't checked the ingredients to know whether they are all natural or not. But I'm sure the ingredients of each can be found on the internet without too much trouble.
artisan creams-try stone cottage, als’s, ginger’s garden, wet shaving products. not artisan, but small commercial companies-st. john’s, eshave, piccadilly, new york shave co. and let’s not forget kiss my face-can be used brushless or with brush. too bad the shave den shop closed down-they made a pretty good shave cream in many scents.
I heard about homemade shaving cream, I think in some ways its better approach if you have sensitive skin, personally I never tried making one myself I usually go with The Art Of Shaving, it work best for me!