Thread: What got you into straight shaving?

I was just wondering where all of you guys got the idea from.

Me, I was browsing ebay and ran into my first (cheap possibly paki) straight and strop. I figured...HEY!!! this is a great idea because I HATE buying those expensive Gillette blades and go through them pretty fast.
So now I'm hooked and am trying to keep myslef from buying too much at the same time (so much for saving on those blades..... )

When I was 15, I was shaving with disposables like mach/shick, which irritated the heck outta my face. An uncle gave me a nice chunk of change for my b-day and I bought myself a Braun for about 300 deutchemarks, which lasted me until like a year and a half ago, when I bought a Philips 6-series. I didn't like the Philips as much as I liked my Braun. That got me thinking about getting a new razor and I looked into straights on a total whim (I was against shaving with blades). Bought a pakistani and 2 jap stones. The paki irritated my face less than a disposable and gave a comparable shave but left my face with a couple of scars. Fortunately, I was already hooked so I bought my Tailor's (Nenad helped me pick it), fixed it up (with a lot of help from X) and WOW. This is my "5 o'clock shadow" (I shaved like 7.5hrs ago) and it's STILL smoother than a fresh shave with a disposable or my Philips.

It was something that was on my mind for years, always thinking about the cost to my pocket and the environment of adding to the landfill mostly, and seriously irked that gillette was getting rich off environmental neglect.

Then I was in Dawson City Yukon (find it on a map, trust me) while doing a theatrical tour with a full beard, well as full as I can grow at least, and looking for an old fashioned barber shave after the run, but since it was just into the off season there was none to be found. I couldn't justify paying for a barber to shave my ligh twhiskers, but a beard I certainly could have and would have loved the pampering.

It kept prying away at me and one day the topic of shaving came up at the day job. I remember saying to a colleague that I'd always being curious about straight razors and he said that he would be adverse to using anything capable of removing his adams apple. I went home and started searching on the interweb and found this place, through the Yahoo forums at first which was IMPOSSIBLE to navigate. Once I came to this new site I knew I had found the community and collective wisdom necessary to make the leap. I still have my last Track II blade sitting around somewhere. I wonder if I'll ever use it?

X

I remembered my cousin getting a shave before his wedding and that stuck with me. In addition my father always used a brush and soap while shaving so that got me interested. Let me tell you after my first barber shave I was hooked. I wanted that feeling every day. Well nuff said.

I'd been using an electric for about 25 years. Always considered shaving a chore and hated how much the daily shave tore up my face (even with new foils and cutters). One day I just got fed up/frustrated and threw my electric against the wall. Figuring there had to be a better way (couldn't be a worse way), I started doing some research on shaving. Started out on the Wetshavers forum and soon found SRP. Used a Mach3 for about three weeks while transitioning to a straight and have never looked back.

Just another data point,
Ed

I think I've always had an interest in traditional shaving but not enough motivation to really get into it. That has changed over the last month. I've been using safety razors a lot and recently bought my first straight razors. I like the hobby aspect, the tools, the maintenance ... the whole thing, really. And it's so much easier to approach thanks to forums like this.

I'd been honing and sharpening knives for about 5 years when I joined the Army at 17 and got shipped off to Germany in 1977. Once there, I found great little shops through the town of Ulm all around the famous Munster of Ulm and one of them was a cutlery shop with all sorts of switchblades, kitchen knives, hunting knives and straight razors. I got several switchblades and a couple of straight razors and a three-sided paddle strop and introduced myself to straight razor shaving. After a few times, the novelty wore off and those hectic days I didn't have the time for a proper shave, so I forgot about and and I still can't remember what happened to that razor. I just remember it was the biggest in the shop.

Years later, I took it up again and don't see myelf ever going back to disposables.

Hi, another newbie here, been thinking of cutting in for a couple of weeks & now seems as good an opportunity as any.
I had never even contemplated using a straight razor until I went to Turkey for a weeks holiday (vacation), for the experience, I went to a Turkish bath and ended up getting shaved "old style".
Up to that point in time it was the best shave I'd ever had & I believe that it must have placed a seed in my mind.
I have been using a straight razor for well over a year now and will never look back.
As an aside, has anyone else experienced the burning tapers that they waft over and inside your ears/nose to remove the hairs ? (In Turkey that is). Quite bizarre but it works.

Shaving with a straight razor was something that I wanted
to do for years. Why?....

1- It seemed cooler than a safety razor

2- Something different. Very few actually shave with one.

3 - It seemed somehow alien in our disposable throw way
society that you would actually buy a razor or two and
use them for a lifetime - and they would still have another
lifetime or two worth of use in them. If I smoked I would
probably carry a Zippo instead of a disposable lighter

4- So after years of desiring to shave with a straight I
finally took the plunge in January and now have 4 of them.
Looking at a couple on Bills page. Do I really need a 5th?
No - but who cares - I want it.............


Terry

I actually use a Zippo, in a nice black leather case (so I don't lose it and drawing it like a gun is a thing of beauty)