1960’s Imperial Leather shave stick

[Jakebullet]

I was walking past an antique shop yesterday.
I often look in these places if I have a minute to see if there’s anything shaving related.
A stone, a razor, a strop a bowl.
On this occasion I saw this 1960’s stick of Imperial Leather.

I have fond memories of using the bath soap as a child in the 1970’s. This was priced at £7.50 so I gave it a go.

I opened it up.
There was very little scent but that’s probably not surprising for a sixty year old soap.
I used it in the standard way and was very pleasantly surprised at the excellent lather it produced.
A little scent appeared at this stage too.

The lather was lovely, very slick and very usable.
The performance was very comparable to a new ish Palmolive shave stick I used last week.
Harder than an Arko stick but not much behind it in terms of performance
It gave me four great passes with my straight razor with slickness to spare.
Now it’s had a drop of water after all these years it might be even better again tomorrow.
Quite a surprise that it’s stayed stable all these years and gave me a great shave here a quarter way through the 21st century.

 

[Jakebullet]

I tried this stick again today now that it’s had its first taste of water.
I used plenty and got a brilliant lather.
The first use was very good but today’s was much better.
Slick, thick and did an excellent job.
This is on the fourth pass, still full and creamy.

 

[Jens]

That is beautiful! I'd love to get my hands on a stick of Imperial Leather.
Like you, I have fond memories of Imperial Leather bars of soap (hand/bath) from when I was a child in the 1970s.
I think my paternal grandma always used that soap, I clearly associate that scent with her.

It has also been my own favourite and goto soap for much of my adulthood (the bar of hand/bath soap that is).

In fact, I regularly used it for shaving too, before I adopted wet shaving as a hobby and just shaved as a chore occasionally.
I would shave while in the shower with a BIC single or dual blade disposable plastic razor, and then simply whip up some creamy lather from the Imperial Leather bath soap, and shave with that thin lather. It actually worked really well, super slick stuff, and under the hot shower you get an excellent shave. I shaved that way for years.

Unfortunately I have quite sensitive skin, and I have found out that my skin does not like the Imperial Leather bath soap very well anymore (I get itchy rashes in my arm pits), so I have had to stop using Imperial Leather soap. I have replaced it with Mitchell's Wool Fat bath soap as my goto, which my skin has no problems with, and that is perhaps an even better bath and hand soap! Nice scent too, but not "that" scent.

It took me a long time to figure the meaning of the name out. In case you don't know it, it goes like this:
It refers to the scent of leather tanned in the Russian empire back in the day (hence the name, Imperial Leather).
The quality of that leather, along with its distinctive scent, had a reputation well beyond Russia, and was much sought after. Somewhere along the way, the scent was copied as a perfume, and you can actually find a variety of "Russian leather" scents as perfumes today, some of them very expensive.

The only comparable scent of a soap in terms of nostalgia effect for me, is the Palmolive green shave stick that you also mention. That scent (and the green color of that stick, in combination) just hurdles me down an imaginary old-time lane.
And luckily, I am not allergic to that (yet).

 

[EclipseRedRing]

Very nice I own many vintage pucks of Cussons Imperial Leather as well as several sticks, with many different packaging styles and use them regularly. Even the sealed pucks I have opened have had very little scent, certainly nothing resembling the bath soap. If you are interested in acquiring a stick or two then keep an eye out in the upcoming charity auction.......

 

[Ravenonrock]

Nice score! I’m often on the lookout for similar in my local shops, so far slim pickins. Enjoy!

 

[malocchio]

As usual with vintage soaps the scent fades but the lather is still great. I used to love Cusson's bath bars , but today the bars made in Thailand are vastly inferior to the old British bars ...

 

[sarimento1]

Great find and equally great report!!
Thanks!!

 

[BigJ]

Congratulations!!

Thanks for sharing!

 

[Jakebullet]

That is beautiful! I'd love to get my hands on a stick of Imperial Leather.
Like you, I have fond memories of Imperial Leather bars of soap (hand/bath) from when I was a child in the 1970s.
I think my paternal grandma always used that soap, I clearly associate that scent with her.

It has also been my own favourite and goto soap for much of my adulthood (the bar of hand/bath soap that is).

In fact, I regularly used it for shaving too, before I adopted wet shaving as a hobby and just shaved as a chore occasionally.
I would shave while in the shower with a BIC single or dual blade disposable plastic razor, and then simply whip up some creamy lather from the Imperial Leather bath soap, and shave with that thin lather. It actually worked really well, super slick stuff, and under the hot shower you get an excellent shave. I shaved that way for years.

Unfortunately I have quite sensitive skin, and I have found out that my skin does not like the Imperial Leather bath soap very well anymore (I get itchy rashes in my arm pits), so I have had to stop using Imperial Leather soap. I have replaced it with Mitchell's Wool Fat bath soap as my goto, which my skin has no problems with, and that is perhaps an even better bath and hand soap! Nice scent too, but not "that" scent.

It took me a long time to figure the meaning of the name out. In case you don't know it, it goes like this:
It refers to the scent of leather tanned in the Russian empire back in the day (hence the name, Imperial Leather).
The quality of that leather, along with its distinctive scent, had a reputation well beyond Russia, and was much sought after. Somewhere along the way, the scent was copied as a perfume, and you can actually find a variety of "Russian leather" scents as perfumes today, some of them very expensive.

The only comparable scent of a soap in terms of nostalgia effect for me, is the Palmolive green shave stick that you also mention. That scent (and the green color of that stick, in combination) just hurdles me down an imaginary old-time lane.
And luckily, I am not allergic to that (yet).

Hey thanks for the response and great history and information.
These soaps definitely have amazing nostalgia value.
Even the text on the box is old school.
It gives the weight of the stick as 1 and 3/4 oz no mention of grams anywhere.
Every time I use it it seems to get better.
The lather got more voluminous on the second use, then slicker on the third, today the post shave was beautiful.
It’s a hard soap and I use it liberally.
What’s amazing is that this sixty year old soap works as well as anything in my den today.

 

[Jakebullet]

Very nice I own many vintage pucks of Cussons Imperial Leather as well as several sticks, with many different packaging styles and use them regularly. Even the sealed pucks I have opened have had very little scent, certainly nothing resembling the bath soap. If you are interested in acquiring a stick or two then keep an eye out in the upcoming charity auction.......

Thanks for sharing, I didn’t know they made pucks of the stuff too, something to keep my eye open for.

 

[EclipseRedRing]

Thanks for sharing, I didn’t know they made pucks of the stuff too, something to keep my eye open for.

They made them in several different styles, often in sets combined with aftershave or talc. Here are some of mine:

Sadly, the soap was missing from this beautiful set when I found it:

 

[Jakebullet]

That’s brilliant! thanks for sharing.