First Shave with a Straight Razor

Yea looking forward to it, it's really relaxing.

From coming out of the shower, to making your own lather, to hearing that distinct straight razor (w/ full hollow) sound as it cuts.

Do you strop before or after? or both?

Personally? I usually strop before, some times I skip it, but 90 percent of the time I strop before.

Afterward I use a stropping motion on a towel, mostly just to dry it off.

But remember, I've been doing this for years, and to me it's just shaving. I don't have to make all this a big deal anymore.

To me it's all pretty simple.

Well thanks for sharing.

It does take longer to shave, prep etc, maybe my enthusiasm will die down.
I remember how easy it was to just press the on button on my electric and watch tv as I shaved.

Congratulations on the good start

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Originally Posted by drgreen

I just had my first shave too! With a Dovo Ivory Micarta.

Not quite as clean as I liked, but I prefer gradual improvement over nicks and cuts!

Tried the WTG and AcrossTG, too scared to use AgainstTG.

Not as dangerous to use as I thought, but after a few passes in a hard to shave setion under my chin, started feeling the razor was burning me with too many passes so I stopped.

Any remedies to hard to shave spots without razor burn?

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Welcome aboard! If you do end up w/ razor burn (and you will), applying Neosporin or a similar antibiotic ointment will help it heal quickly.

All good points here on avoiding razor burn, and I won't rehash any of them. One of the MAIN causes for MY razor burn was:

- Pressure (I was applying too much)
- Angle of Blade (it wasn't low enough)
- MOST IMPORTANTLY - The direction of growth!

I get my razor burn on either side of my neck, and I found that what I thought was cutting WITH the grain was actually cutting ACROSS and even AGAINST the grain on my neck!

That's because on my neck, the hair follicles are obviously having some kind of dyslexic party down there, and they're just sproating every which way but down! So when I tackle my neck, in addition to watching the PRESSURE and BLADE ANGLE, I actually change up the DIRECTION of my cutting on my first pass.

So where my first pass I may go North to South on 90% of my face, I suddenly may switch to an East to West on my neck! Again, that's all on the first pass. I find that with second and third passes, the hair is already initially cut pretty low, so it reduces the risk of razor burn on subsequent passes.

Hope that helps, because it was an awakening moment for me and transformed the comfort of my shaving.

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Originally Posted by AzShaver

Yesterday received my new straight razor and strop from SRD. A Dovo Best Quality 5/8 and a 3" latigo strop. Razor was (as expected from SRD) shave ready. Thank you Mr Lynn Abrams!!! I also received Mr Abrams DVD. What a great value.

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I too acquired Mr. Abrams' DVD and watched it. Served useful in integrating the....

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Originally Posted by AzShaver

I couldn't wait for my first shave.

Pre-shave prep was great, Hot towel, lather, hot towel lather and shave just like Mr Abrams DVD).

I was a bit nervous, but after reading this forum till my eyes were blurry my first shave went very well.

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...many trials and wisdom to be gained from many different people with the full range of experiential knowledge on the subject of open razor shaving (beginners to old pros). No doubt my first shave, which was a relative success (very close on difficult parts of the beard) was highly attributable to the important pre-shave learning and mental practice, visualization and theory behind traditional wet shaving.

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Originally Posted by AzShaver

First shave was WTG. The razor was smooth and cut whiskers very smoothly. Only one small cut on point of my chin (was to be expected.) Styptic pencil stung a little but did its job. Finished up with cold water, Nivea after shave balm, and some grat Bay rum. Seriously, I never thought I would enjoy a shave so much. It took about twenty minutes and several re-latherings but was well worth it. Very luxurious experience. I didn't even have to use my Mach 3 to finish. I felt like a new man.

I was surprised that my first shave did better that my old Mach 3.

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Do you mean for a WTG shave? A question: did you strop for your first shave or did you take some of the advice to not screw with the edge when it comes "fresh" from the honing? (probably stropped by the honer, of course).

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Originally Posted by AzShaver

Great thanks to everyone on Straighrazorplace for all their advice. This site made my first shave easy and memorable. I am definitely hooked.

Also, thanks to SRD for their great service and the shave ready razor I received. My order shipped incredibly fast and any question I had were answered almost immediately. I will definitely order from them again. Thank and best regards to all,

Johan

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Ahhhh. Ain't life sweet? I like their shave soap. Congratulations, dude.