I have to disagree with those who say that this shave cream is moisturizing. I have been rotating this cream a couple times a week for the past few weeks to get a good handle on it, and have been avoiding using any ASB after my shave to actually get a handle on the "moisturizing" properties of this cream, L'Occitane Cade *cream* (new formulation that actually lathers like a champ), and Provence Sante shave soap. The other two products do not leave my face feeling dry and tight, however, Speick definitely does each time. So much so, that after 30 or 45 minutes I find myself going back and applying some Cade ASB to moisturize my face. I do like the scent, but compared to the Cade scent it falls short, however the scent goes very well with L'Occitane L'Occitan EdT. They both have a peppery/lavender scent. I also pick up that "medicinal" scent that another reviewer mentions, but I don't find it objectionable. The cream lathers up very nicely with both a boar and badger brush, and is very stable and gives a good cushion, however as far as slickness is concerned, it is less than the Cade cream, and isn't even in the same league as the Provence Sante soap. With my soft water, a 1/2 strip of cream gives more than enough lather for 4 passes with even my Semogue boar brush, let alone my badger. One thing I have definitely noticed, and I had to wait for it to happen several times to make sure it wasn't just my imagination is that my razor seems to pull on the hair more when I use this cream than with the Cade cream or the Provence Sante soap. The first time I noticed it was on a Shark Chromium blade with 4 or 5 shaves on it. I shaved, and thought to myself "I need to replace the blade tomorrow, this is getting dull." The next morning I forgot to replace the blade and didn't think of it until I was part way through my shave with the Provence Sante soap and I wasn't noticing any tugging from the blade. The blade was cutting through the stubble just fine. The next day I shaved with the same blade with the L'Occitane and the blade seemed fine, next was the Speick, and the blade seemed very dull again. I stopped after just 2 strokes of the blade, washed my face, lathered up some Provence Sante, with my boar brush (I was using the badger with the Speick) and lathered half my face with the PS, and half with the Speick. There was a very pronounced difference between the two halves of my face. The blade seemed much duller on the half of my face that was lathered with the Speick. I changed the blade the next day, and when Speick came around again, the blade seemed much duller than the day before, yet the next day with the PS, it seemed fine again. I doubt that I will replace this when the tube is gone, even though I like the scent, and it can be had for a decent price, especially compared to Cade shave cream, but I happen to LOVE the Cade scent, and the cream simply performs much better for me than Speick does for those days when I want to use a cream instead of one of my soaps.
