Thread: Really lost now...

BeBerlin wrote an excellent article on shopping as a beginner.

http://straightrazorpalace.com/begin...beginners.html

I bought an antique store razor for 15, the 8 dollar soap/brush/bowl from WalMart, and a begginers strop from tony miller for 20. I asked around and got my razor honed for free.

15-razor
8-brush/soap/mug
20/strop
free/honing

43$

You need good, not great. With some experience now, but still a novice, here's the way I would go: If you are on a tight budget you can get the set from RupRazor. $60 for a "good" shave ready razor and strop. While I like the Dovo a little better, the Gold Dollar from Rup is a nice razor, and Ken will resharpen it for free if you screw it up when you get started. Lynn at SRD gives you a shave ready Dovo for well under $100, and even throws in a free sharpening, too. So, you don't need to worry about hones and sharpening for awhile. That said, there are quite a few honemeisters here who can sharpen your razor a lot of times before you hit the cost of all the hones and stuff you will need to sharpen a razor, not to mention the experience.

Some cup soap from Wal-Mart and an Omega brush from Amazon and you're in business. My calculator says this will all cost you around $80 -- you supply the empty cup for the soap.

If you get into it you can always upgrade, and having more than one razor isn't a bad thing. You will also probably cut up your strop as a novice, so the Rup is a bargain, and you can upgrade that, too, when the time comes.