Thread: stropping before and after a shave

You don't need a linen or canvas strop, particularly if you have a felt side on your existing strop. In general you don't really need anything but a leather strop.

The Dovo yellow paste is, as stated above, purely a strop conditioning paste. I have used a pea-sized (or smaller in fact) amount on my leather strops maybe twice in the last 5 years. It is really only necessary to help soften and condition the leather after say a mishap (eg you cut the strop and have to sand out the nick) or if for some reason the leather dries out or needs to be made more supple.

If you dry the razor well and carefully (so as not to damage the delicate edge) after a shave there's no need to strop until your next shave. Many people only strop immediately prior to the shave. However, there is nothing wrong with also stropping immediately after a shave (again, having carefully dried the razor first). Sometimes I have just been walking past the bathroom in the middle of the day and given a razor a quick strop just for the sheer joy of it. You cannot strop too much or too frequently. Just make sure that when you do strop you do it correctly.

Be careful about touching the edge of a razor - it is delicate and you may damage it particularly if you use one of your fingernails. Using the thumb pad is OK but there is a knack to knowing what to feel for - perhaps you know that knack, I don't know. In any event, the weight of probability (in the absence of any other data regarding your experience in and knowledge of these matters) would suggest that the effect you experienced was more likely due to incorrect assessment of the edge than the edge regaining sharpness within a 1/2 hour period.

Good luck.

James.