Ok, onto my favorite: Italian shaving soaps. And not all of them are soft and almond scented.....it just seems that way.
Valobra Almond Soft Shaving Soap
http://base1.googlehosted.com/base_m...bf619b11&hl=en
I LOVE this stuff. It has a nice pastry almond scent, but it's not overpowering, and it's not oversweet like conk and the classic English almond shaving creams. The performance is wonderful - the face feels very good afterwards, and you get a nice slick lather and close shave. It has a putty like consistency, so you take the block and squoosh it into the container of choice - I put it in an anchor hocking bowl. This soap is not tallow based (if you care), but gives an incredibly close shave. It's also very affordable (around $11).
Cella Soft Shaving Soap
http://base0.googlehosted.com/base_m...1fd3085a&hl=en
Another great Italian take on a soft almond soap. This almond scent is a little more "bitter almond" than sweet marzipan. It has no preservatives, and is very nice on the face, ala IK (although no shea in this stuff). I'd say this feels better and more natural on my face than any other soap. It yields a nice close shave, though for me I get a little closer with the Valobra almond for some reason - that's probably just me. I get a thicker creamier lather from cella than valobra almond. I found this performs better when I take it out of the small diameter red plastic bowl and transfer to an anchor hocking, where I have more room to load the brush. This is great great, relatively natural (no preservatives apparetly) stuff. It is tallow based but doesn't feel at all like the old English tallow soaps. Very reasonably priced (around $10). Wonderful.
Valobra Shaving Stick
http://base1.googlehosted.com/base_m...4f710cc6&hl=en
Unlike the soft valobra putty soaps, the shaving stick is hard and tallow based. The performance is as good as any hard soap out there - very creamy, slick, protective lather, that yields a VERY close shave. I find it a little bit drying, though not everyone does. The smell is a bitter soapy smell - for me it's not appealing, not unappealing. So for me this is a just a no nonsense no romance great shave shaving soap. I find it fits nicely in the older larger DRH shaving stick containers, so that's where I put mine for ease of use. Very cheap.
Art of Shaving
http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...160_AA160_.jpg
Rumor is this is made by Valobra - in any event it performs exactly like the valobra shaving stick for me. It comes in unscented, lemon, sandlewood and lavendar. I have the unscented, which smells like wet cardboard on its own. But the performance is absolutely first rate - it's just a great tallow based hard shaving soap. I used the unscented as a face lathering uberlather vehicle - I load the brush with the AOS soap, and then squeez a little KMF on the brush, and face lather away for a great shave with a great (choice of KMF) scent. Done that with CremoCreme for the perfect tallow based pina colada shave.
Things I'd like to try when my wife isn't looking:
1. Valobra Fougere Soft Shaving soap
2. P. 160 Soft Soap
3. Figaro
4. Fitness
5. PREP
6. La Riana
7. Proraso Classic Soap
8. Proraso Shaving Soap with Aloe and Green Tea
9. AOS sandlewood, lemon, lavendar shaving soaps