Thread: THE HOLY GRAIL

Gentlemen:

Since starting with the straight razor, I found myself in a continuous search for the Holy Grail: the perfect shave. I used different razors, soaps and creams. I improvised on stropping methods, razor technique, angle variation and skin stretching. I tried everything within my modest expertise with straight razor shaving to find the Holy Grail.

Yet I neglected to define for myself what exactly the perfect shave was — to me. Each shaver looks for his own Holy Grail. What exactly was mine? I know that in the end it's just a shave, a daily routine that most men undertake. Yet to me, that daily ritual involves extraordinary effort to hone a difficult task. My reward is one of life's great pleasures.

I can't wait to begin my morning shave. Sometimes I am even disappointed when the shave is over, because I must wait until the next morning to repeat the pleasure. When growing up, my two daughters sometimes complained they were bored. My stock answer to them was: "As long as you have a mind, you should never be bored. Look at me," I added, "I've never been bored a moment in my life."

In some way that thought applies to wet shaving with a straight razor, for the colorful ritual framing the act requires a mind that chooses not to be bored.

A baby Bottom Smooth (BBS) face seems to be the ultimate goal as the perfect shave for many gentlemen. Is that, then, the Holy Grail of wet shaving with a straight razor? I have realized recently that, to me, the Holy Grail is more than just getting a BBS. It is a combination of the tangible and the intangible.

I have been a wet shaver, off and on, for about 40 years, exclusively for the past six or seven. Starting out with the double edge razor, in Vietnam I had to switch to the Army-issue plastic safety razor. Afterward my shave bumped along with a variety of other plastic cartridge razors. By then stores had discontinued selling the double edge, and the Internet did not exist, at least not in its current form. Now scores of sites offer shaving products.

Years later I was back to the double edge, bought online, and years after that I fulfilled a wish from my twenties and picked up the straight razor.

Whether shaving at home, at the gym or while traveling, I try to have the best possible shave. Knowing the cluttered, unruly and multi-directional fields of stubble on my neck, attaining a BBS down there is like trying to find the clues to a magical act. That's why I have never gone for the perfect BBS, although some shaves are better than others, depending on a number of elements. They in turn set one shave apart from the other.

A few days ago, while thinking about all this, I scored a fabulous shave. No, it was not what one might consider a perfect BBS. Dots of stubborn stubble on my neck still wagged their tongue at me. Even so, I knew I had found the Holy Grail. It had been right in front of me all these years and I never saw it. Now there it was at last: the Holy Grail of wet shaving with the straight razor.

That day I had loaded the Edwin Jagger best badger brush with Truefitt & Hill soap in the apothecary shave mug, played with it in my warmed pewter shave mug and then applied the rich and fragrant lather to my face. For the razor, I had used one of my best shavers, the Thiers-Issard 5/8" with king wood scales. The stropping had gone exceptionally well on the 2" SRD latigo, the razor rolling smoothly between my thumb and forefinger, with 25 strokes on the linen and 75 on the leather.

The shave — three passes comprising with the grain, across the grain and against the grain — felt as if from the hands of the king's barber. The razor floated on my face as if a royal barge on a calm sea and I as its master. No skipping and tugging. No nicks. Only a smooth glide. The lather remained fragrant and moist through the shave. And still warm.

Finally a touch of Truefitt & Hill's Spanish Leather aftershave transformed me to a 19th century gentlemen club in the company of Oscar Wilde, Lord Peter Wimsey, Dr. Johnson, Charles Dickens and, with special permission of the club, Jane Austen — no matter that they were from different ages.

My Holy Grail was a perfect combination of the tangible and the intangible: I had a great shave, yes, but for some reason I felt as never before after a shave. It was a day that I knew would be fabulous, and that everything would go perfectly smooth.

The tangible was the visual part of the shave and the intangible that ethereal element in my 45-minute journey from the time I stepped into the shower at home until I left the bathroom, feeling as if I were a ray of color in the sunrise.

The Holy Grail: because the tangible and the intangible had blended to create my perfect shave.

So, gentlemen, what is your shaving Holy Grail?

Regards,
Obie