I have frequently posted that I don't believe that there are "soap brushes" and "cream brushes." I've said "Hey, it doesn't matter, they all lather." I then promptly pick up a nice, scrubby brush that most would consider a soap brush when I'm using a soap, and a big, luxurious puffball when I'm using a cream. Whatever happened to talking the talk and walking the walk? 
Well, my experience in the Cade Challenge has finally proven to me, once and for all, that I was right
. In my hands, Cade soap has always been troublesome. It has that alluring scent, but the lather for me has always been mediocre at best. It always smelled great, but produced a thin, unsatisfying lather. In the Cade Challenge, I and many others are sticking with Cade for at least the month of November (I will use it until it's finished), and I had planned to just use the custom B&B Simpson Eagle in Best for the duration. It's a fantastic brush with soaps, and I thought that if anything could lather Cade into submission, it would be the Eagle. 
But no, it was not meant to be. The Eagle was no better with Cade than anything I had used previously.
I then went rotating through my brushes that handle soap with ease, the Rooney 1/1 Finest, the Simpson 57, the Simpson Tulip 2, and the Rooney Beehive. All were better than the Eagle, but still nothing to write home about. Meanwhile, others participating in the challenge were having fantastic shaves with this soap.
On a whim, I pulled out the Savile Row 3824, whose 24 mm knot and 54 mm loft is filled with a dense (but not too dense) pack of badger hair that has wonderfully soft tips. It is not what anyone in their right mind would call a soap brush. In fact, I had used it primarily with creams, a great performer with a luxurious feel. Nothing else was working well with Cade, so I threw caution to the wind and used the 3824, with stunning results. Face lathering Cade with this brush produced a lather that was rich, slick and very effective. It was almost as good as what I get from tallow soaps like AoS. It produced the same the next day too. Today, I tried Cade with the big Simpson Harvard H4, which also has a 24 mm knot, and it delivered just like the 3824.
These results fly right in the face of all conventional brush wisdom, but I now actually believe what I was saying
. A brush is a brush. They will all now get a fair shake regardless of what I am lathering.
Well, my experience in the Cade Challenge has finally proven to me, once and for all, that I was right
. In my hands, Cade soap has always been troublesome. It has that alluring scent, but the lather for me has always been mediocre at best. It always smelled great, but produced a thin, unsatisfying lather. In the Cade Challenge, I and many others are sticking with Cade for at least the month of November (I will use it until it's finished), and I had planned to just use the custom B&B Simpson Eagle in Best for the duration. It's a fantastic brush with soaps, and I thought that if anything could lather Cade into submission, it would be the Eagle. But no, it was not meant to be. The Eagle was no better with Cade than anything I had used previously.
I then went rotating through my brushes that handle soap with ease, the Rooney 1/1 Finest, the Simpson 57, the Simpson Tulip 2, and the Rooney Beehive. All were better than the Eagle, but still nothing to write home about. Meanwhile, others participating in the challenge were having fantastic shaves with this soap.On a whim, I pulled out the Savile Row 3824, whose 24 mm knot and 54 mm loft is filled with a dense (but not too dense) pack of badger hair that has wonderfully soft tips. It is not what anyone in their right mind would call a soap brush. In fact, I had used it primarily with creams, a great performer with a luxurious feel. Nothing else was working well with Cade, so I threw caution to the wind and used the 3824, with stunning results. Face lathering Cade with this brush produced a lather that was rich, slick and very effective. It was almost as good as what I get from tallow soaps like AoS. It produced the same the next day too. Today, I tried Cade with the big Simpson Harvard H4, which also has a 24 mm knot, and it delivered just like the 3824.
These results fly right in the face of all conventional brush wisdom, but I now actually believe what I was saying
. A brush is a brush. They will all now get a fair shake regardless of what I am lathering.
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