French Steel Week April 22-28

[Steve56]

Our fellow member and all-round good guy @silverlifter started Japanese Steel Week, and it’s a shame to not follow up on a good idea. Anyone up for French Steel Week? I’ll start out a couple of days early. Jump in any time.

7/8 Vintage Spartacus, great steel and great grinding. I wish that they were still made like this. The brush is a SOC synth, the soap MdC vetyver, and the AS Myrsol Formula K.

 

[ZeelandsRoem]

I missed the Japanese Steel week as I was too busy to take pictures and post them, but I will do my best this time!

 

[DrStrange]

A bad picture of what I want to believe is an ivory wedge



Horn scales


My most vintage Spartacus

 

[Legion]

This old girl was my daily driver for a long time. Hamon Fabricant A’Paris.

 

[Legion]

I suppose this is an excuse to post this one again.

 

[ZeelandsRoem]

I've been shaving only with vintage French razors for the past two or three weeks. This one was today, a "levier" style:

 

[DrStrange]

I suppose this is an excuse to post this one again.

View attachment 1832913

View attachment 1832914

I don't know, maybe not.
How literally are we supposed to take the thread title?
Could a razor that old, really be expected to have French steel?

 

[Steve56]

I believe that the only reasonable approach is to interpret ‘Steel’ in the title as ‘Razors’. I was trying to be consistent with the thread on Japanese Steel. A lot of different manufacturers used steel from countries besides their own. Both Le Grelot and TI had a Sheffield Steel series, the Japanese used a lot of Fenix steel which is German, and may have used some American steel too, ‘chemical steel’. I think @DrStrange may have a possible reference for this. And of course, the Germans liked Kayser Ellison steel and I have a Dreifuss stamped as such.

 

[Fillifan]

Here is an interesting 1950s razor made by Thiers Issard from a batch of steel poured by a guy named Jacob Holtzer in Chatellerault, France. Though from his name he seems to have been a German. I have seen razors which simply say on the tang, Holtzer steel (acier) so I guess he was a big deal at the time. This is a very high class Thiers in every way but is without any markings. I got it in cutlery store in one of those little Paris passages, sort of like the old Hoffritz cutlery shops in NY. The bowl is buffalo horn with Thiers verbena soap, the alum block Osma, the brush Altesse French premium badger and the stones are coticule and kiita jnat. Shaves are very good indeed Maybe not in the Filly class, but good.

 

[DrStrange]

French steel wasn't commonly used for razors prior to Holtzer.

 

[Steve56]

Another nice TI, this time a vintage 7/8 guilloche spine Bijou de France (Star if France). The brush was AP Shave Co, the soap was long discontinued rosemary lavender by Savonnerie du Bon Berger, and Myrsol Agua Balsamica finished up a great Sunday shave.

 

[Fillifan]

I think bijou means more jewel, trinket, not star. e.g. he loved bijoux or he loved jewels, sometimes little gadgets like modern truc.

 

[Fillifan]

PS I got that TI back in the 60s and the guy in the shop made a big point of telling me about the acier Holtzer, as if I would recognize the name and want to buy the razor more. Apparently, TI had a big stash from the 1900s of this Holtzer stuff and continued to make razors with it. Honing it every so often, I have not noticed much difference from any other razor I have. So it may be a fineness of carbides rather than a Rockwell issue that made Holtzer a deal. The razor is very well finished but has none of the gold panel and etching sort of trimmings that accompany the higher end TIs now. My guess is that it was made to be sold in the trade to a barber supply place, and would just be sold without a name or even made in France. Everything else about it, guilloche spine, jimping, shoulders, is straight high end TI.

 

[Steve56]

I think bijou means more jewel, trinket, not star. e.g. he loved bijoux or he loved jewels, sometimes little gadgets like modern truc.

Ha, you are correct! I speak some French, it was just a brain f@rt.

 

[Fillifan]

I found some notes I had on my TI from when I got it. I think this is a model 69 Professional Barber's model, with barber's nose. But it never got any of the etching and panels of the named TIs. This was one of their fancier "pour barbes dures" razors, with guilloched spine, the nose notch, jimping top and bottom. Nice angled tips to the scales in TI fashion. The TIs can be very fancy and they play on nostalgia in the current line up. Lots of old timey retrograde razors, though maybe all the same in most ways.

 

[DrStrange]

I found some notes I had on my TI from when I got it. I think this is a model 69 Professional Barber's model, with barber's nose. But it never got any of the etching and panels of the named TIs. This was one of their fancier "pour barbes dures" razors, with guilloched spine, the nose notch, jimping top and bottom. Nice angled tips to the scales in TI fashion. The TIs can be very fancy and they play on nostalgia in the current line up. Lots of old timey retrograde razors, though maybe all the same in most ways.

On the older TI's, 69 would be the number that TI stamped on many of their razors
to identify TI as the manufacturer.
Is it an old one?

 

[Steve56]

69 was Thiers-Issard’s assigned manufacturer’s number. Manufacturers in Thiers had a number assigned to them. You’ll find many different TI razors with 69 on the tang or blade.

 

[sanookd]

L.S.& A Paris 6/8 Near Wedge
Grooming Dept Unscented Preshave
Ariana & Evans Peach & Cognac Shave Soap
Lucky Tiger Face Tonic
Ariana & Evans Peach & Cognac Splash
Boellis Panama 1924 Balm
Carnavis & Richardson 26mm Silvertip Brush

 

[TSENG]

SOTD

Durand Brasset 22 France Razor 5/8"
Wedge,Around 1820,
Stub tail,lead wedge,
Jimps tooth design was rare at that time,
This time honing uses Taiwan Stone+Tomo Nagura .
Very comfortable shave.
The mark "22" was registered on 19/5/1817 by Durand Brasset L'héraud Fils in
Thiers. Listed in the Expositions Publiques of 1806, 1819, 1823, 1824, and
awarded with honorable mention at the Exposition Publique in the Palais du
Louvre in 1827.

 

[Steve56]

Le Grelot Lotus, scale work by @mycarver - ream and AS were Floris 89 and the brush a Semogue synth.