Thread: Status update

Hi everyone,

It's been quite a long time since my last post. This is just for sharing, no specific questions about this.

I have been shaving exclusively with a straight razor since I started some time ago (you can check my previous posts about this). I still have the same (and only) razor; actually my grandpas one. I am kind of over the steep part of the learning curve, but still learning new things (less often).

Now the figures:

1- How often. I can seen that every now and then people ask how often do you hone, how often do you strop, how often do you cut yourself. Always remember that this is not an indication of what is right but only the way I do it: I hone kind of three times a year probably, strop on a leather padded strop every shave, and a pasted one (two actually, with different grits of paste) once a week. I barely remember when my last cut was, so it was probably not very important or painful, but let's say that less than once a month is a safe guess.
2- How. Another question that shows up is how: How do you prepare the soap/cream, how do you shave, and so on. I am not a huge fan of "preshave" or "aftershave", so I just use soap-cream. My wife now complains about it clogging the sink (she is probaby right, but I am not certain). When I shaved with spray can foams and disposable cartridges I usually did so in the shower, now I shave in the basin (and it got clogged...). Almost every time I shave I do it after the shower, without drying my face with the towel. I have seen many indications in this forum regarding shaving "across" "against" and such, and even drawing a "map" of my face to know exactly the orientation on each segment. I didn't draw the map, and shave top-down on most of my face, front-back on the main part of my cheeks, and sometimes down-up in my neck (the orientation there is a complete mess, even with "twisters" and such...). I don't prepare the cream that much either; I kind of wet the brush a little bit and twist it once or twice inside the jar.
3- Future: What's next? Dunno. I have browsed our eBay local associate site for another razor, but didn't find anything that caught my attention. A few hand makers have showed up with damascus steel blades or even finished razors but they were kind of out of my budget. I will probably like a wedge but I am not looking for one in particular (not in the near future lets say). I had some trouble getting soap-cream, and even asked for "recipes" for home made ones, but a manufacturer ended up making one. Not the old Gillette or other big companies, but two or three of the unknown (small) ones. One of them was not nice, but another one surprisingly fulfilled what I was looking for. I might be trying something new here. The finest grit honing stone I own is 12.000, so another future addition will probably be a finer one. I have been asking for how to make a hone at home, but people are still trying.

Conclusion: As of now I am glad I gave razor shaving a try; as I wouldn't like to go back to disposable cartridges. I might have been born kind of 100 years too late, as I also enjoy fountain pens, mechanic watches, leather, wood, bicycles, sharpening knives and other oldish things.

Rgds.

Martin