SoS: April 4, 2016 - April 10, 2016

Tomorrow(Tuesday)'s Planned Shave
Prep-Dial 4 Men(in shower)
Cream/Foam/Gel*-Edge Extra Protection(below "Extra Protection" it says "Super Protection" followed by some French. Is "Super" the French word for"Extra"??)
Razor-Pivot + Nation.
A.S.-Clubman Original

 

Tuesday's


TESC Pre-Shave Oil
I Coloniali Delicate Shaving Cream
Jayaruh #56 synthetic
Gillette NEW SC
Personna Blue
CWR, Asma Alum Block
Thayers Rose Petal WH
Pinaud Clubman

The I Coloniali (the Colonials) Delicate Shave Cream turns out to be a non-lathering shave cream. I did my best to lather it with my Jayaruh #56 synthetic brush but with no results. Two passes with the Gillette NEW SC razor with a Personna blade gave me a close, comfortable shave. After a cold water rinse and alum block, I finished off with Thayers Rose Petal WH and then Pinaud Clubman After Shave. I am clean, smooth, and refreshed...

Edit: This shave cream rinses off very clean, but I don't like that it is non-lathering. You cannot see where you have shaved. You have to feel your way if your memory is as bad as mine. I am going to give it a couple of more shaves before I make my final decision on it.

 

that's what I call taking care of one's skin

 

I looked it up and I Coloniali means "The Colonials." I am looking forward to trying it out for the first time. I got it in a pif last month, and put it in rotation starting tomorrow. Planning on seven days...

 

Tuesday Planned SOTD



Razor: iKon Standard\Jurgen Hempel Ti
Blade: Gillette Spoiler (D5)
Brush: Simpson Duke 3 Best Badger
Bowl: Buffalo Horn 5”
Pre Shave Scrub: MRGLO
Pre Shave Oil: Homemade Bay Rum w Lime
Shave Soap: Holy Black Bay, Whisky & Lime
Post: Monster Alum Block
Aftershave: Ogallala Bay Rum W lime & peppercorn
​

Tomorrow shave will include two first for me, The Holy Black Bay Whisky & Lime which smells mighty fine and Simpson's Duke 3 in Best Badger. Have to say disappointed in the Duke and hasn't even been used once. Noticed right out of the box that there was two loose hairs so plucked them out then proceeded to run under cold water to get some of the initial funk out of the knot. Right away around a dozen or more hairs flushed out of the brush. I then gave the knot around 10 swirls on Master Brush Cleaner as I always clean a new brush I get in and noticed another dozen or so hairs popping their ugly little head up and washed out when I rinsed the brush under cold water. Right now soaking in cold water and no I do not soak the whole knot as I leave about 1/4" from the handle exposed. Will wait and see what happens after the soak and tomorrows shave but thankfully my friends back in St. Louis who bought me this brush for my birthday purchased via Amazon so I shouldn't have any problems if I need to have it replaced.

 

Nice Krona, the emblem is in great shape!

 

Here's my setup which can force a penguin to move away from the North Pole!

Tuesday morning's action:

Neutrogena Men Facial Wash
Razorock Plissoft 26 mm Monster
Junjie/Astra day 2
Stirling Glacial Eskimo Tuxedo SS
Stirling Glacial Spearmint AS Balm
Stirling Lemon Chill WH
Grey Flannel EdT

At last, at long last I had the opportunity to see for myself how wonderful the scent of the Green Irish Tweed fragrance is in the form of the Glacial Eskimo Tuxedo soap. I test-lathered it before and my Plissoft brush made the lather explode and I mean EXPLODE. The menthol freeze is so POWERFUL just like the other Glacials, and you get such a terrific post-shave sensation. The Glacial Spearmint balm can also freeze a man's face to Kingdom Come and I love the lovely scent from it as well as the soothing. Why this witch hazel is not called Glacial is a mystery to me because it's frigidly-cold, and it has such a beautiful tangy lemon scent!

 

It would not be super unusual for that brush to let go of a bunch of hairs the first time out of the box, and lose a few for the first half dozen shaves. They aren't actually hairs coming loose from the knot, but hairs that were never actually glued when making. If it doesn't quit, then a guy has a real reason to worry, but it is normal. I don't know why Simpsons do that when other high end, dense knots don't, but they do. I have had several that molted a little bit when they were out of the box and first lathered, then quit after a shave or two.

From the Superior Shave website, where I have bought most of my Simpsons:

"So, how do you tell if your brush is really a "Shedder"? When you pair extreme density, hand-tying/packing, and deep settings, the degree of difficulty of pairing 100% of those strands with the glue is elevated. If a 25000-bristle unit made the deep-and-dense-by-hand way achieve 99.5% success of gluing the hairs to the base of the knot, I'd be pretty happy as a firm making brushes by hand. But that still would mean 125 strands are due to be shed. The easy answer is to just cut down the length of the hairs on the side of the knot that goes into the handle (minimizing the propensity for a strand not to make it all the way to the bottom because of the density) or to machine-set them, but the machines can't set 'em as deep and dense, and hair's expensive (typically hairs of the same 'grade' that are longer fetch more per unit of their weight than shorter/more common strands of the same 'grade' of quality). Some firms will trim a tiny bit on the back, and at least one we deal with has told me unequivocally on their top class that they will not trim a single millimeter. Generally you can expect a Simpsons to shed quite a bit on the first few uses, but if it is still letting go of 5+ after a dozen or so uses, or suddenly starts to shed months after owning when nothing had shed before, it is all too likely you do have a problem."

My bet is that it is going to be just fine, sorry for the rant if this isn't you first or one of your first Simpsons. Good luck.

 

That's a damn fine setup if I do say so myself brother!!

 

I was curious if others had shedding issues with the Best Badger knot has I have a chubby 2 in Super and did have a Tulip 4 in Super and M6 in Manchurian and my first Simpson was a Colonel 2XL I believe it was called in Best and none of them shed a hair. Only kept the Colonel for one shave and traded it as too small for my liking but appreciate the feed back noted above. I figured before you sent the Superior Shave info I would give it five shave to see what happens but the Duke wasn't as dense as I thought it would be compared to the other 3 Simpson noted above.

 

The only ones I had that dropped hair right away were a Duke in Best, a Classic in Best, and a Tulip in Super. The less dense models, like a Colonel, and a Commodore, or my one Manchurian (not saying not dense, just different grade of hair) basically never lost a hair. They all came out of it right away. I should point out that Simpson is the only "high end" brush I have bought new, others were all used, so if there was a break in period, I missed it. I just know Simpson seems to be the only one that has a flaming ass-rep for it.

Mine are all good. Hope your turns out that way.

 

That's a nice setup, love the Krona! Did your Tabac come with the wood lid?

 

Thanks my man - I owe it all to you!

 

Those Stirlin' soaps do look relatively easy to shave from.

 

SOTD April 4, 2016

Razor: Blackbird
Blade: Polsilver SI
Brush: Duke 3 Manchurian
Soap: Stirling Almond Creme
AS: TN Dickinson Witch Hazel, Stirling Curveball

Today was Day 2 in my cold water shaving experiment. The cold water process is fine, but I kind of miss the "pampered" feeling of the hot. Face lathering with cold just feels kinda foreign. It was another fine shave, so I certainly have no complaints, but it is still way too early to form an opinion.

 

They lather in no time flat. I remember when the Glacials were pitiful at lathering but Rod's hard work really paid off. ALL his soaps, I repeat, ALL his soaps are a pleasure to lather and to shave with!

 

@crackstar Penguins live at the South Pole.

 

@MarshalArtist And?