Thread: What is the "canonic" way to use a two-piece shaving mug?

I have tried the search function, but I was unable to find an answer to this question--so I would appreciate the help.

I have a mug that looks like this:



Essentially, it's a 4" diameter mug with a detachable shallow bowl that fits in the top, the latter also featuring two prongs designed to hold a brush. Surely, this item hails from the days when hot water from a tap was not the common thing it is today, so I gather that holding hot water would be one of the primary functions of this mug.

In this spirit, I have used this mug in four different ways--all more or less satisfactory:

1 - Fill the mug with piping hot water, then make lather from shaving cream in the little bowl on top. Benefits: warm lather; drawbacks: the top bowl is a bit narrow and shallow to make lather very comfortably.

2 - Fill the mug with piping hot water, then make lather from a soap puck in the little bowl on top. Benefits: same as making lather from any soap puck; drawbacks: the warmth of the water in the mug underneath does not transfer to the puck and consequently to the lather.

3 - Make lather in the mug, and use the shallow bowl, detached, as a brush-holder during shaving. A bit anticlimactic, although the lather was nice.

4 - Fill the mug with piping hot water, use it to soak the brush; make lather either in the shallow bowl, detached, or in a separate bowl. This too felt anticlimactic, since I have a sense that I'm not really using this thing the way it was intended.

I know that probably none of these methods is the one for which this mug was designed, so I'll be grateful to anyone who can tell me the historically-correct way to do this.

Thanks

Tom

Good question and I am awaiting an answer because I don't know either.

Regardless of any answer you get, that mug is really cool!!

Thanks--yes, it is really cool! I guess this is one of the reasons why I want to make full use out of it and not feel like I'm only half-using it.

Part of the experience of wet-shaving for me is to give a "soul" back to these old objects...

I want one

maybe its an ashtray you carry around .... with a cigar holder ??? ...lol

my guess is like yours , id put hot water in the bottom and lather in the top ...lol

I reckon it's (1), just like placing your shaving bowl in the sink in hot water. Maybe it was a 'travel' set. I can imagine it being used in a cabin on a ship...

My dictionary, admittedly old, makes reference to a connection with a musical canon. I guess that means that as long as you whistle while using it you're OK.

You may want to look at the size of the brushes that were used back then. Your bowl probably originally came with a matching brush.
The style then was for a brush about a 1/3 of the size of the ones we use today.

I have one very much like that. Here is what I do. Put hot water in the bottom, up to where it won't spill out when the top is put on. Then make shaving cream by using your brush in your mug, and transfer the cream to the top part by squeezing it out of your brush with your fingers, into the top.-- It helps to put the whole thing in hot water before starting, to warm it up.