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Back to the future

I started examining the older ways of shaving out of an overall interest in the older ways of doing things in general. At the moment, I am awaiting with anticipation the arrival of some shaving items including a Badger hair brush and a DE safety razor. Eventually, I will likely transition to a straight razor.

Meanwhile, I have retrieved from cold storage an old brush which I used years back and have been trying various techniques of pre-shave preparation. The tutorials on this site have been extremely helpful!

I believe the brush I am now using (pending the arrival of my badger brush) is horse hair. When I first bought it, is was advertised only as a "natural bristle brush". I found a Van der Hagen puck in the local chain drug store outlet to go with it. It's nice, but after trying the sample from the AOS store in Bellevue, WA, I will be purchasing one of their "gourmet" soaps in the next few days.
 
Welcome! Wet shaving is just another example of new technology not necessarily being better.

There seems to be a common pattern involved. Many years or decades in the past, there was a certain way of doing things. Then somebody came up with an "improvement". And then another, and another.

Finally, over time, all of these numerous "improvements" issued forth in a new product, or new method, which is, if anything, worse than that which served as the starting point!

Along the way, each of the improvements was, in fact, well motivated. They made the original cheaper, or safer, or faster, or more convenient. Or they solved a problem, or a perceived problem, with the previous technique. But in the end, it just doesn't add up.

I can't say from personal experience (yet) that this is what happened with shaving technology, but it seems to be the experience of others on ths forum. For the moment, I am working on the pre-shave portion only. And I can say that proper pre-shave preparation produced an immediate improvement in my shaves.

Thanks to all who replied for the nice welcome and advice!
 
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