AoS Sandalwood

Boy is this stuff pricey! It works though, and works well. The lather produced is thick, creamy and stays on thick and slick. The scent is mild, pleasant and it appears the puck will last quite a while.

Maybe this should be merged with the original AOS Sandalwood review section:

http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php?ltr=A&t=36176

This is a grand soap if one is willing to pay the price. At forty-five dollars with bowl and twenty-four dollars for a refill, it is nearly three times as expensive as comparable tallow soaps. Is it worth it? Well, I'm not in a place to judge. I got mine (with bowl) at a sale for half price! More seriously, I do feel that you are at least in part paying for the brand name (and for keeping the B&M store in business, for that matter) but this soap is of too high a quality to be dismissed as a rip-off.

To start with, the scent is wonderful; it is manly but gentle. It will caress your nose, not overpower you and force its way in.

A nice scent will not a save a soap that produces poor lather, of course, but this soap positively shines in that category. Granted, it's a bit picky about the amount of water you use and it may require a few tries before you get the right balance, but magic occurs once you do.

To give an idea of kind of lather this soap provides when managed correctly, I need you to picture all the qualities you expect from a tallow soap: The thick but slick lather, the vast quantity of lather that is guaranteed to last through any one shave, the creamy texture that simply can't be found elsewhere. Picture all of these qualities in place in a single soap, an archetype of tallow soaps if you will, and you have Art of Shaving's Sandalwood soap. The thick, creamy texture is an especially notable strong point of this soap and it feels wonderful on your face. Also, it will not irritate your skin or leave you feeling too dry if you suffer from dry skin. This stuff is expensive, but it is high quality.

On a final note, I feel obligated to say that the bowl the soap comes in is a nice piece of work, given that I’ve complained about the price. It's made of (in the case of mine, at least) beautifully grained wood and makes a handsome addition to your countertop. I'm not sure it's worth an extra twenty-two dollars, but it is nice.

In short: If you're willing to drop the money on this, I highly recommend it.