Thread: "shave the lather, not the beard"

Yep, shave the lather!!! I am being mentored by razor field. During our initial lesson he told me to "shave the lather". When I tried it I made a nice stroke that felt and sounded good, the razor glided across my face. Once I got home I found myself concentrating on other things and not paying attention to minimizing pressure. The result was a fair amount of razor burn

There was another thread on here about pressure causing me to adjust my focus and Shave the lather. This resulted in a close comfortable shave with NO razor burn.

Great idea to give this it's own thread, it is important.

I like it so much I put up a suttle reminder for myself...

Good advice. Thanks

I've never heard this before but I need to try to follow this the next time a shave. Great advice!

Just a quick perspective from a total noob who is still working on all aspects of straight razor shaving. I think that the need for multiple passes may trick you into feeling the need for more pressure. What I mean is, you take that first pass and then give the spot you just shaved a quick feel and even though you may have cut some beard and heard the right sounds, the tactile feedback of your touch says "hey - doesn't feel like you did much of anything here!" So, of course, what do you do but try it again with more pressure. I guess it best to focus on "shaving the lather" and then proceed with the next pass without over evaluating how well the first pass did.

With my beard, it seems like if I take another pass in the same direction with more pressure and reevaluate, it seems like that worked better! So you get bad reinforcement of the bad technique. Still working on it all, but perhaps this is some food for thought for some of you. (Please pardon the way my over-analytical anal retentive mind works if this makes no sense to you!)
Jerry

Thank you for this always timely reminder to all.

Even with hundreds of shaves - just because you can add more pressure does not mean that it is a good thing...

Smooth Shaving..

Originally Posted by Jerrybass

Just a quick perspective from a total noob who is still working on all aspects of straight razor shaving. I think that the need for multiple passes may trick you into feeling the need for more pressure. What I mean is, you take that first pass and then give the spot you just shaved a quick feel and even though you may have cut some beard and heard the right sounds, the tactile feedback of your touch says "hey - doesn't feel like you did much of anything here!" So, of course, what do you do but try it again with more pressure. I guess it best to focus on "shaving the lather" and then proceed with the next pass without over evaluating how well the first pass did.

With my beard, it seems like if I take another pass in the same direction with more pressure and reevaluate, it seems like that worked better! So you get bad reinforcement of the bad technique. Still working on it all, but perhaps this is some food for thought for some of you. (Please pardon the way my over-analytical anal retentive mind works if this makes no sense to you!)
Jerry

I was clueless till this thread and had the wrong perspectives too. This past week with five shaves and no major razor burn, with two days in a row, normally could only handle two shaves in a week. I was trying to get too much on the first pass. ATG is still aways away but with great advice like "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee." from Razorfeld and others here I'm finially getting it.

Originally Posted by ChopperDave

I like it so much I put up a suttle reminder for myself...

Shame I'm in uni accommodation and can't take the same approach - I feel I'd really benefit from it! I'll have to find another way to remind myself of this instead...