Thread: taylor "how to" strop

anyone check out the taylor of old bond street site and their "tips" section? in the section on stropping, they say to strop on the leather side first and the linen side second.

i know this runs contrary to every other bit of wisdom on stropping, so what's up? has anyone pointed out this guffaw? or is intentional? get people to shave with a poorly-stropped razor, thus needing more post-shave creams/gels/bells/whistles...

taylors has started opening shops here in asia and the fellows here in the taiwan shop seem to think that leather first/linen second is the way to advise their customers. bad business plan if you ask me...

cheers,
jake pollock

I suppose it's worth posting the link here....

http://www.tayloroldbondst.co.uk/hin...straight_razor

Is that it?

Rather poor description. Its not that uncommon to hear of people who strop leather then linen. I don't think you'd obtain any benefit.

I think it depends on the strop. For quite a long time I've felt I've got a better result on the Illinois strops going leather first then linen (don't know why) but my Jemico red leather is exactly the opposite. Don't knock it if you haven't tried it....some guys'll even put ashes on their strop....
John P.

Fire Ash! Thats crazy! Oh, thats a good point about the various strops. I forgot about reading that on here. I'm curious about what the differences are between those two strops that makes the order reversal better.

And ofcourse as you guys probably know, when you get the class offered by Trumpers they have a specific strop they use and sell. So that process might work on thier strops better.

Honestly,
I don't know, but you can even see the difference on the microscope as well; but so far I've only had these results on the Illinois strops; maybe it's the weave of the linen? I have no idea.
Pretty soon they'll have a separate ward for us at the state mental facility....I can see it now..."Yeah, really sad, this patient insists on putting fire ash on his razor strop....." "Oh that's nothing...you should see the loony tune down the hall....strops on linen LAST sometimes" **GASP**
I've also tried rubbing soap on the linen side of a strop as well as candle wax...not sure it made a huge difference but my Grandmom said they used to do that to Great-granddad's strop.
Go figure
Only way to find out is to try it I guess
John P