Crabtree and Evelyn sandalwood soap

This Sandalwood soap seems to be widely used but in my opinion a little underappreciated. So what is good about it? It smells good, lathers nicely and takes care of your face in the most gentle, comforting manner (thanks to the added vitamin E ). Yes, it certainly isn't as exclusive as Trumpers or others but does it give a less good shave? No, shaves are great, time and again, and my face never feels dry as with many other brands. To sum up: just a great workhorse shave soap.

This is a very good smelling soap, I can generate a lot of lather, but the shave is poor. My razor does not glide across my face when I use this soap. The razor skips and stalls when I am shaving.

The one way I have found to make this soap usable is to combine the lather from the soap with a bit of Palmoive shave cream. Tha way the resulting cream smells great and lubricates well.

I really do like this soap but for me it has two problems.

1. Excellent thick creamy lather but not enough lubrication
2. When dry the soap smells awesome but once lathered, it looses much of it's smell.

Definatly in my rotation.

Sorry, but I thought that this soap was a disappointment (as compared to Proraso in a tub). It lacked gliding ability for the razor and had very little moisturising effect on the skin. The smell is questionable sandalwood (I bathe with real sandalwood soap from Mysore, India every day). Smells more of Cinnamon. It lathers well though. The smell I can live with, if only it had a better glide and moisturising effect.

I use this soap on a regular basis. I can whip up a very dense lather that really shaves well. I actually think this soap is a "go to" soap for me. I love the scent and the quality.

A very good product. Not the greatest thing in the world....but very very good.

Worth the money.

Very inexpensive for a nicely sized hard milled puck, and very good, as well. Just not up to the standards of its high end brethren. I always get a good shave, but it doesn't compel me to choose it more often than I do, which is not much at all.

For the price, it is a very decent product. I can always get a good lather going without much work.

It smells great in the bowl, but I think the scent is somewhat lost when you actually use it.

This soap has a wonderful scent. Yes, it's not as strong once lathered, but I smell plenty of sandalwood the entire shave.

While this soap lathers quite easily, I find myself using more soap than I normally would with a triple milled soap to get good lubricity. Don't go light on the soap and you will be rewarded.

For a triple milled soap in a wood bowl, the price is nice. Not quite as good, both in price and performance, as Tabac, but it's a soap if you're on a budget. An even better price if you just get the refill cake.

Lovely smelling soap, I find the smell does linger when lathered up, as with a few other comments, it seems to dry very quickly and does not moisturise, the blade can skip and jump. Price is reasonable but the moisturising lets it down.

This was my first soap and is still my favourite. I loved the c&e sandalwood cream so much that I bought the soap as well, and it has not disappointed.

Price: $25 Canadian, not too bad, and the wooden bowl is top quality
Quality: perfect in every way
Scent: I looooooooove this scent, true sandalwood or not (I'm no expert). I find in lingers just fine before, during, and after the shave. WONDERFUL! MMMMMM!
Lather: I use lots of water and go back and forth between wooden bowl and bowl I make lather in, and get tremendous amounts of slick, rich, yummy smelling lather. I love mixing it with the c&e cream as well when I really want something special.
Efficacy: perfect
Moisturizing: Doesn't dry out, doesn't provide anything extra, to me anyway

If you like the cream, you should DEFINITELY get some of this soap, and can be found much cheaper if just getting the refill puck. The wooden bowl, though, is worth the money! Get some, you will not be disappointed!

As my first hard-milled soap the C&E sandalwood was quite a disappointment.

Products compared to: Proraso green tube, C&E almond oil cream, Surrey Glycerin soap, Kiss my face peaceful patchouli cream.

After 3 months of use in direct comparison with the above listed products the C&E soap comes in dead last. I find it difficult if not impossible to create a consistent creamy lather whether lathered in a bowl, on my face, or even after rubbing the soap puck on my face and lathering directly on top of it. Water was used in varying amount from a nearly dry brush to sopping wet, the end result was always a lather that provided little lubrication and yielded a dragging skipping shave whether used with a DE (fatboy adjustable) or a straight. Poor lubrication aside, after 30 seconds or so with the soap on, my skin would begin to burn and turn red. The scent was found to be pleasing but weak and not resembling what I expected from "sandalwood".

Before posting a negative (and contrary to other reviewers) review I performed a final evaluation in order to determine if there was something in my technique in using this soap that had been missed.

Test Round 1:
A B&B silvertip brush was soaked in hot tap water for 5 minutes while I stropped the straight and moistened my skin with a hot towel. The brush was shaken vigourously to remove most of its water and stroked back and forth on the puck for half a minute. This was then moved to a bowl and whipped for another half a minute. Water was added to the bowl in small steps and whipped until a glossy stiff peaked lather was achieved. Whipping action was predominantly a linear affair (vs circular, swirling). The lather was then applied to skin after a splash of water directly to the face, again in a linear fashion. The right side of my face was shaved with the straight and required a very light touch in order to avoid skipping. In the time it took to take one pass (top to bottom) on only the one side, the left side had already dried and began to crust under the nose. The left side was rinsed and lather was reapplied from the brush. This side was shaved with DE and skipped liberally and cut right above my jaw bone. Red splotchy marks had, by this time, appeared on the right side of my face.

Test Round 2:
The brush and bowl were rinsed clean and lather was prepared again the same as in round 1 except for the use of slightly more soap and addition of even more water to create a lather that was a bit past stiff peaks in order to avoid drying and the addition of more soap an attempt at increasing lubricity. The shave was much the same except this time the straight cut the right side just under the jawbone. Drying and irritation as well as lack of lubrication was the same as round 1.

Test Round 3:
The brush was cleaned and shaken twice. Soap was applied directly to a clean wet face until just slightly bubbly and slick. Lathering was performed directly on the face until reasonable coverage and moisture content was achieved. Again dragging, skipping, and premature drying occurred yielding another small cut from the DE just below the chin.

In the 4 months I have been using a DE and straight razor i have only cut myself 3 times (using other creams/soaps) with the straight (2 during the first week of use) and not once with the DE. With this soap using the DE became a dangerous and uncomfortable process causing consistent bloodshed likely because of the increased surface area of the razor head and the severly underwhelming lubrication afforded this soap.

Conclusion: After shaving with this soap ~15 times I'm ready to dump it in the garbage. Close shaves without nicks/cuts are impossible, the application of nivea sensitive aftershave balm burns like hell, lather is short lived, and my skin gets bumpy and red. On the plus side it smells nice and comes in a purdy box. At $1.25 a puck the surrey soap yields a much more enjoyable shave and the proraso and C&E almond oil cream (both $8 on sale) are like miracle products in comparison. Even the KMF cream (used with a brush) yields a far superior shave.

I picked up a puck of this when I picked up the $85 C&E brush. My first couple of shaves with this soap were less than satisfying. I found that the soap dried quickly and lacked the kind of glide I expected (to be honest there wasn't a whole lot of glide). Went back to Truefitt and Taylor creams.

After a couple of weeks it occurred to me that maybe I needed to wet the soap first to soften it up. I filled my shaving bowl with hot water and let my brush soak. At the same time I put some hot water on the soap and let it soak. After a nice ten minute shower I found that the soap really loaded up the brush well and I was able to build a nice lather in the shaving bowl. The glide was much improved and I got a nice shave.

I find this shave soap excellent for the price. I paid $8 for a refill puck. I have Trumpers Sandalwood shave soap and I think the C&E is comparable. I think I paid $18 for the Trumpers refill. Being a hard milled soap, this should last me a long time.

I agree with the original reviewer, this is a much underrated soap. At present this is my favourite soap. It has a superb sandalwood scent and gives an extremely good lather, up there with the best for me. I let some hot water sit on the soap for a few minutes and then empty it off before lathering on top of the soap itself. I've only given it an 8 for moisturising properties as I don't think many soaps have that effect but it is reasonable in that aspect, comparatively speaking. As with many soaps, it can disagree with some skin types but that is not reason in itself to mark it down and I don't have that problem with it myself. In terms of price it is very reasonable and I believe it is comparable with the best soaps out there for overall quality. This soap gives a superb shave and I am bemused at the comments saying it doesn't, maybe the soap used was from a lesser quality batch. If I could never use another soap and had to use this forever I would be more than happy.

This is a decent soap. It has some plusses, some minuses, but the bulk of my feelings towards this soap is neutral. The price is not bad but there's not alot about this soap that makes me really excited about it right away, after using it for a few shaves.

On the plus side, it's sandalwood. What's to hate about sandalwood? Nothing. The scent is faint and not overpowering, and sandalwood seems to go with anything for cologne. If you don't like it or afraid it will clas, it doesn't last too long anyways.

On the minus side, it isn't the easiest to lather. It's a hard, triple milled soap and you must use the proper amount of water with it and work it long enough to see results. Pouring water on top of the puck for 30 seconsd or so then decanting into your bowl and mixing with a soaped brush seems to give better results. Also, while the lather is not as drying or caustic as Williams Mug Soap, it isn't exactly moisturizing either. Still, with some pre-shave oil or normal-to-oily skin, you should do OK with it. It's just not great on the "skin food' factor like a softer glycerine soap would be. In terms of lubrication and razor glide; it's better than the Williams again but not up to the average cream, at least in these relatively inexperience hands.

So, in short I think this is a soap that might have some fans- more experienced shavers who can work the magic with this soap. For novices or people wanting an easy shave, look elsewhere.

I find C&E to produce very good quality soaps at a very reasonable price. I love the scent of the soap with a slight hint of smokiness. I lathers easily with any brush. The lather is very dense and slick. I find this soap to work very well for me. Some folks have expressed lack of slickness, but I have yet to experience this. All in all a very good soap.

This soap may work for others, but did not work for me. The lather was weak and not creamy at all. It did not lubricate well at all, and like others on this forum, the razoe skipped horribly on my face. I didn't even finish tthe shave because I was so angry.

I gave the price a 5, because I think it depends upon whether you buy the jar/container, or just the refil. I got the refill puck for $8 which I think is great. $25 to get the included container is a bit much, IMHO.

The scent is nice. Once lathered, it is more subtle, but I counted that as a plus because a straight whiff of the puck is quite rich.

It lathers and shaves very well, and has similar properties of the Tabac if you are familiar with that; though I'd say the C&E Sandlewood produces a softer, "airier" type of lather.

All in all, a good buy. But I would suggest the refill puck over the entire package, or you end up paying more for the jar than the soap that comes in it.

I used this soap last about a month ago before it ran out. I guess everyones experience will be different, but I had no problems with blade skipping, poor lather, etc. It worked very well and I never got a cut from using it. In fact usually the only time I nick myself is because I was careless. The scent, once on the face, fades out a little more that the other C&E scents, but that is a minor issue. I just wanted to add my two cents since so many others have had less than stellar experiences with it.

Yeah I've got to agree with the dissapointed responses here.

I found the lather to be quite easy to make but for me, although I'm inexperianced, it seemed to dry fairly quickly.

My most important criticisim of it though, and this is not technique or experiance dependent, was that after the lather had been on my face for more than 30 seconds it actually started to sting. A little sting at first, then it got to quite an uncomfortable burn.

After this happened twice, I wasnt prepared to try it again so I sold the barely used soap to a mate for $5.

Anyway, to those who are willing to work with it to get the lather and whose skin agrees with the soap itself (unlike mine), the scent is just fantastic.

I switched to the Nomad soap as it is meant to be a 'calming' soap and found it to be similar in lathering respects to the Sandalwood, but no where near as nice on the nose.

All in all, an un-usable soap for my face, but I hope YMV.