Thread: Animal-free brushes?

The Body Shop synthetic is a very good brush (not spectacular, but darn good for the price.) Being so inexpensive, it is a good way to find out if you like synthetic. If not, you haven't spent much (if memory serves they are in the $10 vicinity) and because it is small and the nylon does not absorb water, they make excellent travel brushes.

I am currently the owner of a EJ Synthetic and an EJ Best Badger. No, I didn't order them both to compare the two and do tests, however...fate has that way of making us do stuff...

Without going into the details as to why I have two brushes, no I don't have BRAD either, I must say that unfortunately the badger is much better.

That said. The synthetic brush is actually very very very good. The bristles are smooth on your face, it hasn't shed a single one and the water retention is also very good. However, the badger does hold more water and is less scritchy on your face. The problem with the nylon bristles is that they are tough. Much tougher than badger hair. The tips are soft, don't get me wrong, but the shafts are very strong, so face lathering is a big no no.

All that said, the EJ synthetic is a GREAT brush. While you can't face lather with it and have to adjust the brush strokes for application purposes, the bristles are soft, it holds water well, and the handle is very nice too. And no badgers were harmed during the process. Plastics on the other hand....

Unfortunately its a tradeoff between killing badgers, a renewable resource, and killing oil, unrenewable resource.



Btw, now that I'm done with the synthetic, if anyone is looking for one, I'm probably going to be selling it.

I have to give props to the Body Shop brush myself. I really enjoy it so far. I do however want to buy a badger brush to really compare and see how well the synthetic really works.

omega makes a synthetic, called the "Syntex", that is apparently pretty good. I've never used it, but I do know that Omega does good work.

Muehle-shaving.com make a few brushes. They are all filled with Edwin Jagger's synthetic head so they are very good quality. Also Rooney makes a synthetic.