Thread: The Great Common Soap Experiment!

I figured I'd post this in the beginner's section, since so many new guys start with soaps (and other gear) they find locally in drug stores, Walmart, etc. All of the below listed soaps/creams were used in conjunction with brushes found in these same retail establishments, with the exception of two (I was running out of brushes and mugs!). With that said, I believe the "cheap" brushes would actually have performed as well or better than the two, as I will note below.


So, I just spent about the last 30 minutes going through all the soaps/creams I've been able to find locally and building lather with each of them. This isn't an end-all, be-all guide to building lather with any particular soap/cream, but just some observations and real world examples of how the soaps commonly found in the wild can perform. Also, I hope this serves as an encouragement to you all that you don't have to have the best and most expensive gear on the planet to get a good shave (though it may add a sense of luxury and is rather enjoyable).

Okay, so first up, we have Williams Mug Soap (left) and Van Der Hagen Premium (right).




Williams Mug Soap: This soap is commonly found in many stores, and the cost ranges from under $1.00-$2.00. It has been around for a long, long time, though has undergone a change in the formula. After this change, people have complained that it doesn't lather or perform well. As you can see from the image, that's not entirely the case.

In order to achieve the results above, I used the brush and mug from the Van Der Hagen Luxury shave set. This set has a badger brush, though they also make an identical set with a boar brush. I originally purchased this set for ~$30 from my local Walgreens drug store. It also came with a puck of their Luxury Scented soap, which we'll visit further down.

Williams is a VERY thirsty soap. I soaked the puck in a mug with very hot water while my brush was soaking in another mug (around 5 minutes), then dumped the water off the puck and left just enough water to cover the bottom of the mug I used to build the lather. I then squeezed the excess water from my brush, leaving it relatively dry. I then loaded the brush for approximately 30 seconds, making sure the bristles appeared as though they had been dipped in white craft glue. I then began to whip the lather up, which took about two minutes of solid whipping, only stopping to (very) quickly run the bristle tips under the running water from the tap. The end result was a thick, creamy lather, which was very slick. Also, this was the first batch of lather I made, and the photo was taken approximately 25 mins later, showing that you truly can use Williams "for a lasting lather". The results when applied to skin are as follows:


Van Der Hagen Premium: This soap is the one that comes in the Van Der Hagen Premium shave set. Also, the brush was from the same set (though mine was cream colored instead of the normal black handle). This set is usually found at most any drug store, grocery store, Walmart, Target and other retail establishments. I would almost venture to say it's the most common set/soap/brush you'll find in the wild, as the soap and brush are also available for individual purchase. In short, this one is everywhere! Also, this soap is commonly in roughly the ~$2.00 price range.

For this batch of lather, I soaked the brush and puck again in hot water for about 5 minutes. I then poured off the water from the puck and shook the brush 3 times lightly so that no excess water was coming out. The bristles were still well saturated. I loaded the brush on the puck for 30 seconds and proceeded to build the lather in a second mug. I whipped the lather for about 90 seconds, stopping once to, again, quickly run the tips of the brush under water from the tap. The results were a very stiff and slick lather. Though still certainly usable for a good shave, this one was a bit on the airy side, as evidenced by the following pic once I applied it to my skin:




Three more to come in the following post...