Thread: straight razor shave 1

First, a thank you to rodb for selling me my first straight and to cudarunner for answering my endless questions over the last week or so, a great source of knowledge you are.

Now to the shave.

I did a WTG pass on my cheeks and my neck, as those were the places that i could easily get without feeling awkward and/or uncomfortable. I seems to have a tendency to let the blade dip below the desired angle to cut hair, resulting in the razor laying on my face and cutting nothing. I will clearly be working on that. after pass one i had missed some and shaved some and got just a little to be pretty smooth. on a positive note, offhand was not a problem. second pass i stuck with XTG just on my cheeks, as again that was a thing that felt comfortable enough to try. more successful in the cutting of hair and maintaining good angle. still lots of spots left, but more left smooth. at this point i whipped out the DE and shaved with that, happy with my accomplishment. no nicks, no cuts, no irritation. win

some thoughts after the fact.

i must find better ways to stretch my face that let me see the mirror.
cant stretch face when your fingers get soap on them, alum block gives traction.think of this before its to late next time
you are still terrible at this. dont let the little accomplishment go to your head.
try wetter soap next time. see if that work better.


next report: shave 10

Sounds like a good start, you are on your way. Congrats.

Sounds like your first shave went much better than mine! I didn't lose any skin, but a little blood was shed. This was a couple of years ago and I'm still learning, especially from the great information on this site. For skin stretching, I rub my fingers across the alum block and have no problem with traction.

Glad you liked the razor!
From the sounds of it a very successful first shave and it will only get better! Sounds like you did a lot better than I did on my first shave

Sounds like a good shave for a beginning. No major cuts or nicks. And you have both ears still!
Take it slowly and progress as you feel comfortable with it. Not a race. In time you'll be a pro and know your face pretty darn well.

Glad to things went well! I would recommend practicing lathering your soap to find the sweet spot. Only takes five minutes to sneak into the bathroom and whip a batch up. Try with more/less water, more/less soap. Its great practice and will really speed up the learning curve.

Matt I should clarify that It wasnt so much a bad lather. . . It was the same thick lather that has done me great with my DE. But for the straight it kind of felt like I was dragging through the thinkness and losing the slickness I wanted.

I don't know what soap you use, but many of us prefer a tallow based soap as it seems to give a better cushion than a glycerin based soap. I can use just about anything with a DE but I'm much more selective when shaving with a straight, my favorites are Tabac and Arko and a few small batch tallow soaps.

Originally Posted by Shavetime

Matt I should clarify that It wasnt so much a bad lather. . . It was the same thick lather that has done me great with my DE. But for the straight it kind of felt like I was dragging through the thinkness and losing the slickness I wanted.

The product used was Simpsons lavender.

I'm confident it will do what I need it to. Just have to work it a little different than a have before.