Modified Marco Method.
For hard and medium soaps and croaps:
1. Soak your brush in medium hot water for a couple of minutes..
2. Turn your brush upside-down. I usually give a very slight flick of my wrist, but do not shake. Keep most of the water in the brush. You want a nice wet brush.
3. Hold your soap over the shaving (I use the Captain's Choice Copper) bowl, slightly pointed down. Start making swirls on the surface of the soap. You have to proceed slowly, without pressure on the brush. Remember that it's very wet.
4. Heavily load your brush for about 45/60 seconds making around 100/120 swirls. Please keep in mind that the loading time and number of swirls also depend on how big your brush is and how much water it can retain. Try to aim the overflow so it goes into the bowl.
5. After the brush is loaded, get any excess lather from your puck into the bowl, set your puck down, pick up your shaving bowl and begin building your lather in the bowl.
6. Add a few drops of water as needed to get the lather consistency dialed in.
7. Apply the lather to your face.
Note: If you are using soft creams, place an appropriate amount (usually ~1/4 teaspoon) in the center of the bowl. Soak your brush. Partial (small) flick of the wrist. Swirl your wet brush around in the bowl until your lather is the consistency of yogurt.
Full attribution: This is taken from the 'Marco Method' originally posted here:
My lathering technique with Italian soft soaps - https://www.badgerandblade.com/forum/threads/my-lathering-technique-with-italian-soft-soaps.199887/
I modified it slightly to suit my preferences.
Hope this helps.
That's how I lather my puck soaps intuitively. (Sadly that amount of water doesn't always work for softer soaps that I press into the bottom of my bowl, as some are just not that thirsty). However, what I did not do was turning the brush upside down. Tried it yesterday with (soft, pressed in the bowl) Cella, and man what a difference. The soap just exploded. Thanks for the tip!
