A Tale of Two “14’s”

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These are my two 14’s. What follows are my opinions and observations.

A little background. Last year I purchased the Korrat 14 2.0. The razor Ulrick made for me met all my expectations. I still use it for around half my shaves. So every other day. Every winter is my busy season for plowing snow in my dump truck. That OT is my play money. The Korrat was on my radar for quite a while before I pulled the trigger. And I have zero regrets. Ulriks inspiration was also on my radar. But the costs for one in good condition were and are , usually higher. So to my mind the 2.0 was a better option.

Fast forward to this year. Had some OT money in my pocket. And found a Filarmonica Especial. At a reasonable price. So I was finally able to see for myself what a lot of people think are superlative razors.


Upon receipt of the Filly it is in very good condition. Either lightly or never used. A nice example of what I think is a second gen 14. The scales look original. With minor dots of discoloration on the blade.

Here are my observations.
Fit and finish. Here it is obvious that Ulrik pays much more attention to detail than the workers of Filarmonica would have been allowed to.
Scales. The Filly plastic ones are nice. But once again here the mass production element is just slightly less impressive.
Jimps. The vintage razors jimps create a non perpendicular angle to the blade. Where the modern take are larger and done squarely.
Grind. The Filly is most definitely thinner. The thinnest, loudest and most flexible blade out of my razors. Most of which are extra hollow. But it does not lay flat on the hones. This combination made for a very challenging honing. To keep my pressure light enough while doing rolling x-strokes.
The Korrat is a nicely executed extra hollow grind. it is dead flat on the hones.

Now after having both and comparing them to each other I can see why Ulrik picked this model to do his version of. It (Filly) is a great razor. One that is a joy to use.
Both have met my expectations. One made by hand. Start to finish by one man. The other in a factory by many skilled people with high standards. But most likely quotas to meet. Meaning the time for each step in production was limited. Probably not enough time to get it "perfect". Not a slight.
These are two very good razors. Making for the difficult decision of which one to strop up and use. A good dilemma .
My $.02 Ken