I don’t know if you read this article, but it’s pretty popular on the net. It advocates a return to the old style of shaving claiming that the shave is superior in quality. They also allude to the fact that you can stick it to the man by not falling into the cheap razor expensive blade scam. At first I thought the author was a shill for classicshaving.com who he links to numerous times, but I have discovered the truth.
I have a problem that my hairs are thick and numerous. I get very many ingrown hairs on my face, especially if I shave too thoroughly. I’ve been using various razors over the years, but mostly I use Schick cartridge based razors with a can of shaving cream. I tried to make things better by getting a mirror and shaving in the shower. That helped a little, with the heat and all. But I haven’t been truly clean shaven for years. And my face has not been without blemish for the same amount of time. So despite this potential advertisement disguised as article, I decided to give it a shot.
My roommate went in on it too, so we could share info and improve skill quicker. We bought Vulfix badger hair brushes and Merkur heavy duty DE razors as the article suggested. We also bought shaving cream in a tub, but he got some girly rose scented crap. I got unscented hypo-allergenic stuff for sensitive skin. We also bought some extra blades.
My roommate was too excited to shave so the day the package arrived he shaved as soon as he got home. When I got there I saw him and he looked more clean shaven than I’ve ever seen him. Not bad. Sure, he might have tried extra hard, so I couldn’t be 100% sure until I did it myself. So I shaved. Right away I was pretty surprised. One of my worries was that a “real” blade would cut me up. But when they say “safety razor” they mean safety razor. It’s more safety than you think. When you use the brush you can feel it pulling your hairs up, it’s great. The shaving cream has a funny smell that I don’t enjoy much, but it goes away very quickly. When I shaved I could tell right away there wasn’t going to be any burn or in-grown hairs. The normal irritation of shaving was all but gone. I still had doubts, however, about the closeness of the shave. It looked pretty close, but nothing spectacular. When I was done I splashed the cold water on my face. This made the hairs recede, just like they were supposed to. Some parts of my face felt as if they had never been hairy.
So I say to you, if you are a man who shaves his facial hair, read the article above. Shill or not, it is no lie. Shaving the old fashioned way is far superior to the crummy modern Gillette way. If you’re willing to spend just a few minutes more shaving you’ll get a big reward. Not only that, but new blades (with 2 edges each!) are $5 for 10, sometimes less. Considering you get about 10 shaves per blade that wipes the floor with the mach 3 economically speaking. But of course, the price of entry can be a bit higher. It pays off in the long run, trust me.
