Hi Gents
Greetings from Central Japan where it feels like autumn is slowly approaching.
Anyway I wanted to ask what your favourite preshave product is and why?
I have used the following over the years:
• TOBS aromatherapy oil (nice and thick, great scent but perhaps too much for my DE Razor and brush). Clogs up the Razor and leaves oil on brush.
• TOBS preshave gel (nice lavender scent but not really sure it did too much from memory)
• Trumpers sandalwood skin food. Great scent. Who doesn't like a fresh sandalwood hey. Not a bad skin feel, mild shave feel performance but no great post shave remnants. I think it would be better placed as a post shave toner IMHO. In fact I seem to recall that's how I ended up using it.
• Dapper Dan beard oil back in the days when you could buy in a nice barrel shaped bottle. (Great scent-tonka and vanilla), good skin feel and balance of absorption and light coating to provide good shave feel and post shave skin feel.
• Floris No.89 shave oil. Great scent and great skin feel. A little light but great all rounder(big floris fan)
• DR Harris preshave lotion. Nice simple Arlington scent but frankly didn't live up to its heritage and price. When i used it i didnt feel that it did anything other than smell nice. When I looked at the ingredients today I realized it is basically a perfume with one added anti static hair ingredient!
• Prorasso preshave creams. Good all-rounder here, and great performance for its cost. Predominantly stearic acid and water. That's why the cream is nice and thick, with the sickness of the glycerin. Stearic acid is naturally found in coconut etc. Guessing cheapness and ease of production lead to its use here.
• Carthusia preshave oil. Again amazing fresh scent. A nice light oil suitable for use in the hot humid summer. A little light for me in the sense that it doesn't feel like there was much post shave feel but still a very good product. One I still reach for.
And lastly
• my own homemade facial oil. It definitely has room for improvement (with addition of a couple more oils, plus a botanical extract) but frankly (IMHO obviously
) it is really good. I use a combo of golden jojoba oil, grapeseed and sweet almond oil. My current version is scented with Hinoki and Japanese sweet orange. Vit.E added as an antioxidant. The grapeseed oil provides great absorption while the jojoba oil leads to an amazing shave feel. Then post shave my skin feels well moisturized. It's a little light now with the approach of autumn so will reformulate for a slightly thicker version.
I used to be in between whether a preshave was truly necessary but now with my oil I definitely would feel the difference if I didn't use it.
So I would be really interested to hear your thoughts on what you use and why you feel it is good.
Thanks all.
Greetings from Central Japan where it feels like autumn is slowly approaching.
Anyway I wanted to ask what your favourite preshave product is and why?
I have used the following over the years:
• TOBS aromatherapy oil (nice and thick, great scent but perhaps too much for my DE Razor and brush). Clogs up the Razor and leaves oil on brush.
• TOBS preshave gel (nice lavender scent but not really sure it did too much from memory)
• Trumpers sandalwood skin food. Great scent. Who doesn't like a fresh sandalwood hey. Not a bad skin feel, mild shave feel performance but no great post shave remnants. I think it would be better placed as a post shave toner IMHO. In fact I seem to recall that's how I ended up using it.
• Dapper Dan beard oil back in the days when you could buy in a nice barrel shaped bottle. (Great scent-tonka and vanilla), good skin feel and balance of absorption and light coating to provide good shave feel and post shave skin feel.
• Floris No.89 shave oil. Great scent and great skin feel. A little light but great all rounder(big floris fan)
• DR Harris preshave lotion. Nice simple Arlington scent but frankly didn't live up to its heritage and price. When i used it i didnt feel that it did anything other than smell nice. When I looked at the ingredients today I realized it is basically a perfume with one added anti static hair ingredient!
• Prorasso preshave creams. Good all-rounder here, and great performance for its cost. Predominantly stearic acid and water. That's why the cream is nice and thick, with the sickness of the glycerin. Stearic acid is naturally found in coconut etc. Guessing cheapness and ease of production lead to its use here.
• Carthusia preshave oil. Again amazing fresh scent. A nice light oil suitable for use in the hot humid summer. A little light for me in the sense that it doesn't feel like there was much post shave feel but still a very good product. One I still reach for.
And lastly
• my own homemade facial oil. It definitely has room for improvement (with addition of a couple more oils, plus a botanical extract) but frankly (IMHO obviously

I used to be in between whether a preshave was truly necessary but now with my oil I definitely would feel the difference if I didn't use it.
So I would be really interested to hear your thoughts on what you use and why you feel it is good.
Thanks all.
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