Boar brush and the Slant: Great shave
This morning I had one of those shaves so smooth that you keep unobtrusively (or so you hope) feeling your face: the chin, the cheeks, the neck: all with no detectable trace of stubble.
Part of this is probably the Omega Pro 48, which is coming along quite nicely now. I worked up a fine lather with the HoneybeeSoaps.net “Old Spice Type soap”. I haven’t compared this with the current Old Spice soap (if they still make it), but it’s quite nice, contains shea butter, and makes a good lather.
I was enjoying the brush and soap so much that I lathered some extra time, building the lather on my beard after loading the brush well. And then I shaved with the vintage Merkur Slant, holding a Schick Platinum Plus blade—a wonderfully smooth and easy shave, stubble removed easily and efficiently.
Three passes, a splash of Old Spice, and I’m ready once more to continue the Great Kitchen Purge.
Michael
Old Spice soap is no longer in production but NOS and used pucks are fought over by wetshavers on ebay. I bought a never used puck and it is really a good soap .
Anonymous
21 November 2011 at 8:41 am
That was the soap I used in high school. I wonder if there is NOS Old Spice aftershave from that era. The current aftershave strikes me as smelling very different.
LeisureGuy
21 November 2011 at 10:51 am
Some wetshavers have said the current production Indian made/licensed Shulton OS aftershave is close to the original classic, a number of vendors have it in the 50 ml or 150 ml bottles. If I compare the scent of the bottle you have with the Indian made Shulton cream I have the scent of the cream is a lot better.
Anonymous
21 November 2011 at 11:07 am
I’m a vendor and this is going to come across as seriously bias but those Omegas are super underrated. IMO, they work better than a lot of brushes 5 and 10x the price.
-Joseph, ItalianBarber.com
Joe
21 November 2011 at 1:25 pm
Had that EXACT shave today with my new Merkur Slant 39c! Rarely does a first shave go so well, but I was amazed that the Slant confirmed every positive thing Michael’s ever said about it. It will make a perfect second razor, as in shaving with it once or twice each week at the very least.
___________________
@Joe:
I can second that. My Omega 48 is as good as I’ll ever need.
zaine_ridling
21 November 2011 at 9:35 pm
The gold finish on your Pro is a sweet touch
joe’s worthy observation almost makes me wanna raise the price of Pro’s but danged “competition”
for those who dont have a Pro its now available in a nice set that incl ver y nice metal custom stand & soso bowl @ a very reasonable price compared to the brush alone. Hate these teeny tiny keyboards
Hyperwarp
22 November 2011 at 4:18 am
@Zaine: Yesterday, after learning that guys with red hair seem generally to have stubble that’s thick and tough but skin that’s sensitive—the Slant Bar’s ideal target—I went to the mss. for the next edition to add the note that the Slant may be particularly appealing to them, I decided to use boldface in the sentence that followed: “In my opinion, a Slant Bar should be your second razor.”
BTW, now that you have the razor, you can see the very thing that is somewhat difficult to describe in words. I’m beginning to think that it was only Merkur that thought of the twist in the blade to make the slant direction the same on the two sides.
LeisureGuy
22 November 2011 at 5:56 am
Never thought of marketing it to women, but would make a fast, safe shave of the legs. And now that I’ve used it, I’m dumbstruck on why Merkur doesn’t market this razor better. I will shave with a slant at least once or twice a week from now on. The other thing that surprises me is why other companies don’t manufacture their own slant razor. Is it patented, perhaps, or just not popular enough to bother?
zaine_ridling
22 November 2011 at 9:25 pm
I doubt that it’s the patent issue—these things have been around since the 30′s, I think. Probably just not large enough a market. The mystery to me is why the razor is not more readily purchased it. I’ve now put my recommendation in the book—that the Slant Bar be a shaver’s second razor—in boldface, but I doubt that even this drastic step will have much of an impact. It’s difficult to get people to try something new: that’s the sad conclusion I’m now reaching, but I don’t understand it. I view myself as loving something new—only in certain fields, I admit. But if a guy is already interested in traditional shaving, I wonder why he would hang back from trying a Slant Bar.
LeisureGuy
23 November 2011 at 6:17 am