Thread: Is linen necessary?

Originally Posted by richmondesi

Something interesting that I noticed in the barbers manuals that I've seen discussed that horsehide strops aren't good for barbers because it "doesn't have sufficient grain to draw out the edge of a razor or a sufficiently smooth service to put on a good edge." I just wonder if the linen was added to make up for the insufficiencies of horsehide. I don't know

I don't know either, but it makes a great excuse to need both horse hide AND Latigo, doesn't it?

Oh, and fabric helps too, so you need all three .

Is there a general consensus on what the absolute best linen strop available is?

And what's the distinction between linen and cloth? I thought they were kind of interchangeable as basically a slightly rougher strop than your leather one.

Originally Posted by IanS

Is there a general consensus on what the absolute best linen strop available is?

And what's the distinction between linen and cloth? I thought they were kind of interchangeable as basically a slightly rougher strop than your leather one.

I'd say that for some strop makers linen and cloth are interchangeable. Having said that, for my money a real linen strop provides a better resource for edge maintenance tool. I've read a lot of differing opinions on this, but I haven't had any better luck with anything than my Tony Miller Horsehide/Linen combo. Having said that, Robin is a huge fan of the SRD strops (as are other respected guys) and there are other strops that I've seen that get high praise sans linen or cloth... I guess you just have to test it for yourself really

Personally, I use pasted linen after the shave as it seems to coat the edge with a fine layer of the paste which, I guess, might protect it from corrosion.