A little background. I started shaving with an Gillette Atra and moved to the Mach 3 when it came out. Used that for about ten years (paying out the behind for refills!), until a little over a year ago when I decided to take a hiatus from working for a couple years and finish my degree. Obviously, this meant that my girlfriend and I had to cut down on expenses, which included expensive cartridges. We hopped by the local warehouse club to do some shopping and bought a 40 pack of store brand 3-blade disposables for <$20 and called it a day.
Fast forward a year, and I'm running out of razors. After hearing me complain all the time about how hacked up my face is with the bargain brand razors and 2/$2 cans of Barbasol, she surprised me on my birthday with a Merkur Classic, Rooney 3/1, beautiful chrome stand, a sampler pack of blades and creams, and a bar of Col Conk's Amber (she must have done her own research, as I had never mentioned these to her before).
Enter the learning curve. Wow....the first two shaves were like unrated deleted scenes from the Saw movies. I was covering my face with dry lather and shaving like I did with cartridges (long, hard, hurried strokes with a single WTG then a painful ATG pass). Thanks to Google for bringing me to B&B, where I read up on everything I was doing wrong and quickly changed my ways. After a couple weeks of daily shaves and slow practice of my technique, I finally gave myself my first DFS with no irritation. Here was the shave, and the main things I learned that made a big difference.
About 22 hours after yesterday's shave I took a nice how shower, running my face under the water for a couple minutes.
THE LATHER! Wow, I cannot stress enough to new guys like me how important it is to really work and hydrate a proper lather. The dry lathers I had used when I started would quickly turn foamy/scummy after applying it to my face, while good lather has surprising staying power. The mug I have is a little narrow and deep, so I made a super lather (learned from mantic's videos) in my hand with the Col Conk's soap and some Penhaligon's Blenheim Bouquet shaving cream I got in the sampler. Luxury.
I did three passes, two WTG and one ATG. I made sure to follow proper technique and lock the wrist to help maintain a good angle. I definitely took something else away from the mantic videos (specifically the one where he is getting shaved in Vegas) in regards to blade pressure. The barber there said something along the lines of making sure that you remember you're shaving the hair, and not shaving the skin. With this visualization in mind, it was a lot easier to maintain a nice, light touch, especially during the ATG pass.
Finally I did a warm/cold rinse and applied C.O. Bigelow Elixer Red ASB. I am shocked at how close the shave was and how good my skin feels now. I wouldn't call it BBS because of a sensitive spot on my neck where my hair grows in a spiral pattern, but as for my face and chin I can't imagine it getting much closer. Thanks to B&B for bringing fun back to my morning routine!
Fast forward a year, and I'm running out of razors. After hearing me complain all the time about how hacked up my face is with the bargain brand razors and 2/$2 cans of Barbasol, she surprised me on my birthday with a Merkur Classic, Rooney 3/1, beautiful chrome stand, a sampler pack of blades and creams, and a bar of Col Conk's Amber (she must have done her own research, as I had never mentioned these to her before).
Enter the learning curve. Wow....the first two shaves were like unrated deleted scenes from the Saw movies. I was covering my face with dry lather and shaving like I did with cartridges (long, hard, hurried strokes with a single WTG then a painful ATG pass). Thanks to Google for bringing me to B&B, where I read up on everything I was doing wrong and quickly changed my ways. After a couple weeks of daily shaves and slow practice of my technique, I finally gave myself my first DFS with no irritation. Here was the shave, and the main things I learned that made a big difference.
About 22 hours after yesterday's shave I took a nice how shower, running my face under the water for a couple minutes.
THE LATHER! Wow, I cannot stress enough to new guys like me how important it is to really work and hydrate a proper lather. The dry lathers I had used when I started would quickly turn foamy/scummy after applying it to my face, while good lather has surprising staying power. The mug I have is a little narrow and deep, so I made a super lather (learned from mantic's videos) in my hand with the Col Conk's soap and some Penhaligon's Blenheim Bouquet shaving cream I got in the sampler. Luxury.
I did three passes, two WTG and one ATG. I made sure to follow proper technique and lock the wrist to help maintain a good angle. I definitely took something else away from the mantic videos (specifically the one where he is getting shaved in Vegas) in regards to blade pressure. The barber there said something along the lines of making sure that you remember you're shaving the hair, and not shaving the skin. With this visualization in mind, it was a lot easier to maintain a nice, light touch, especially during the ATG pass.
Finally I did a warm/cold rinse and applied C.O. Bigelow Elixer Red ASB. I am shocked at how close the shave was and how good my skin feels now. I wouldn't call it BBS because of a sensitive spot on my neck where my hair grows in a spiral pattern, but as for my face and chin I can't imagine it getting much closer. Thanks to B&B for bringing fun back to my morning routine!
