Thread: Trumpers Straight Shaving Lesson

Well I just got back home from a trip to London, where I had my straight shaving lesson at G F Trumpers shop in Curzon Street, London.

I don't know how many of you folks have been there but it's quite a small looking place from the outside, when you get inside you find it's quite a long thin shop and has 2 floors inside. The front part of the ground floor is the shop, and has an amazing range of creams, soaps, brushes, razors, colognes, strops, and many other things. I could have spent a couple of hours browsing the shelves, it's like an Aladdins Cave!

I met Melvyn who was giving me my lesson, he took me downstairs to another room full of shaving cubicles. The place has wood paneling on the walls, deep carpets, and thick red curtains round all the cubicles. Each cubicle (and there must be about 15) has a proper old barbers chair, and alll the bits and bobs each barber needs.

Melvyn took a look at my gear and was immediately looking a bit peeved to see I had a spike point razor (5/8 Bismarck spike). He wanted to teach me with a shavette type straight he had, but I insisted on using mine as this was the razor I'd be using every day. He also started on the hard sell, trying to get me to buy a shavette as they're "great for learning on" apparently. I firmly declined and we started the lesson.

He was very impressed with my strop, a No1 Best Heirloom hanging strop from Tony Miller. He was so impressed with the quality that he called the manager of Trumpers downstairs to have a look at it. They were amazed when I told them what it cost (approx £35 British Pounds), as they sell their own really cheap-looking thin and flimsy Trumpers hanging strop for about £85!

In fact 2 managers came to look at it and were almost drooling over it, and raving about the width and thickness of the leather, and the quality of the workmanship. So I wrote the address of Tony's website down for them, maybe they'll place some orders!

Anyway we started the lesson with some stropping, and Melvyn put some french paste on the canvas side of my strop. It was just a kind of tacky paste, not an abrasive paste as such. Then, standing next to me in front of a big mirror he showed me how to hold the razor, and showed me the different strokes for different parts of the face - using both right and left hands. When he was happy I had grasped the concepts ok, he sat me in the barbers chair and gave me the hot towel treatment. After the hot towels he rubbed a generous amount of GFT Skin Food into my beard, before lathering up the right side of my face with GFT Limes Cream. He then shaved the right side of my face slowly, explaining each stroke. He did 2 passes, with and against the grain, and it was pretty smooth afterwards. He only nicked me once with the spike point, I just laughed as he looked a little worried!

Then I stood up and lathered the left side of my face, and shaved 2 passes of the left side by myself, with Melvyn making a few comments like "keep the handle higher", "keep the razor flatter to the skin there etc". There is a lot to think about when you'[re a newbie so it was nice to have him keeping an eye on my technique. I finished my two passes without drawing any blood, and my side was just as smooth as the side he'd shaved. 1 - 0 to me.

Then he gave me another hot towel treatment, and after that some GFT Moisturiser on my face. Considering it was just two passes it was a pretty nice shave, though still a little rough against the grain. I'm sure this will improve with time, and maybe a third pass.

I got the impression they were really trying to get me to buy as much stuff as possible while I was there. They kept suggesting things for me to buy, including a Bismarck round point razor, moisturiser, alum, soaps etc. But I explained I had a lot of those products at home anyway, and that I was on a strict budget. I just picked up some more GFT Coral Skin Food and a pot of GFT Rose shaving cream, which I'd planned to get anyway. I got the distinct impression they are used to rich folk going in there and coming out with about £1k worth of shaving products. I think they were also a little embarrassed to tell me the price of their strops when they'd seen Tony's one.

I'm not sure if the experience was worth the money really. If I hadn't had SRP for info and also Lynn's DVD to watch, then it would have been perfect, but I probably already knew 95% of what I needed to know before the lesson started. I guess that shows just how good the SRP community really is.

I passed Penhaligons on the way back to the railway station so I picked up a bottle of 'Blenheim Bouqet' for myself and a bottle of "Malabah" for my girlfriend - I just hope she appreciates it!

If anyone wants more info about this please ask.

Cheers.

Thanks for the report! It's nice to hear guys were drooling over Tony's wares.

oooooh next time I am over on that side of the pond I will have to go their and bring one of my bigger razors and my custom monster Tony Miller strop and see it they pass out!

I'll get around buying stuff by telling them I wont let anything under 8/8 even remotely close to my face, I have my own personal soap mistress, and a custom strop maker...man have the SRP members spoiled me or what!

Living near London, I tried the Trumpers lesson too (and had it with Melvyn). As I went before I saw Lynn's DVD and hadn't done too much research in advance, I was quite pleased with what I learnt and thought the price was errrr "expensive but not astronomical", especially given the prices of anything in Mayfair!

I agree wholeheartedly that that there seemed an element of hard-sell, which I thought was a shame, because it made the experience less-than-relaxing by having to explain that I had some of the equipment and didn't intend on taking out a mortgage to buy everything else: I think I bought a few bottles of stuff, but nothing like what they suggested.

The French Paste is something I was interested in: it seems to increase the friction between linen and razor, but not sure if it has any obvious purpose. Ideas?

I'm not really sure what the french paste is to be honest. It came in a little block that looked like a lump of Play-Doh, we just rubbed a really small amaount on the canvas side and it made it a little sticky. I noticed when stropping on that side before, I did maybe 50 passes at home and the canvas looked pristine with no change in coloration, but after the paste was applied it started to pick up some black marks after only 6 passes. I don't know if it's dirt or tarnish or metal that's coming off on the strop, but something is...

Well done Iwan! I love the part about Tony's strop. Hey Tony, maybe they'll stock your products!

Jordan

On the strop front: the ones Trumper brands as their own are basically Dovo strops (same goes for Taylor) with a different name stamp. The fact they charge £70+ for the best one is ludicrous. Classic Shaving sells them for less than that (numerically) in US dollars and a place in the UK (different barbers, different stamp) has them for around £25.

French Paste: I tracked some down and it is just like a cross between plastercine (sp?) and soft chalk. It really doesn't feel abrasive at all.

Originally Posted by Iwan

but after the paste was applied it started to pick up some black marks after only 6 passes.

Looks like that is your TI white paste. French. The black marks are metal particles, and the paste is abrasive. I wouldn't put that on my strop...

Nenad

Thanks for the write-up, Iwan!

Is Alex still giving shaves and lessons, he spent time with me 9 yrs ago...I used trumpers products for almost 20 years its good but over priced... lots of great products around...I would never put paste on linen ...your teacher was trying to help save your face...use a round point razor not a spike point until you get alot of experience with str8...the spike point is a mental distraction and can with limited experience cause some damage...kind of like playing with a garter snake and a rattle snake both bite but different consequenses...