Thread: Sheffield versus Solingen

Just an observation on my part that I find interesting. It seems to me that the British dominated the straight razor market from the eighteenth century up until the late nineteenth century when the German and to a lesser extent the Swedish steel makers started to take a piece of the market. By the twentieth century the made in Solingen mark seems to be the dominant force in the straight razor market.

What I find interesting is that so many of the German made razors were marked as being made with Sheffield steel. Many of the current Thiers-Issard razors are still marked this way. Most old barbers I have spoken to on the subject favored full hollow ground Solingen made razors. It seems to me that the reputation that the early Sheffield steel developed so impressed the other European manufacturers that they considered marking their razors as being made with the Sheffield Silver steel logo a selling point. I recently scored an old Puma model 73 marked made with Kayser-Ellison Sheffield Steel.

I'm not saying one is better then the other as I find that whether made of British, German, Swedish, or American steel a good razor is a good razor. I just find it interesting that the reputation that the Sheffield steel made such a great impression on the straight razor world.

I think that Sheffield steel had (and has) such a reputation simply because it is good stuff. It is made from Swedish iron, as English iron is not of sufficient purity. In my experience, Sheffield steel is generally (though not universally) easy to hone and pleasantly gentle on the face.
German grinding in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries had a similarly fine reputation, and many Sheffield blades were sent to Hamburg for grinding.
The demise of Sheffield and the rise of Solingen, though, probably had more to do with the Germans embracing mechanization and modernized working practices than the relative merits of the products of the two cities.

Mmmm!!!!!!!
Sheffield Kropp's are prized more than German ones!! or so I've read here.
I must admit, I like the spike point shape razors produced in the USA myself and they seem to hold a world class edge..