Is the obsession with BBS a new(ish) phenomenon?

[gpjoe]

I stumbled across the "14-Stroke" shaving diagram that apparently is still taught to new barbers. Looking at the diagram, all of the shaving strokes are WTG or XTG except on the lower portion of the neck, which are ATG.

Which got me to thinking:

When exactly did the idea of BBS take hold?

Pretty sure that a cowboy trotting into town with his face covered in dust and a two-week beard was thrilled to pay two-bits for the socially-acceptable shave he got in 14 strokes. Likewise any 19th century gent either shaving himself or at the local barber shop.

Even today this is considered a typical barber shop shave.

Anyway, it seems to me that a comfortable shave which resulted in a clean-shaven appearance was the primary goal (and likely still is for many) and yet shaving seems to have evolved into an obsession with BBS.

No right answers, just a curiosity to me.

 

[Kix]

I constantly chase a BBS shave. It's part of the perfectionism that plagues me in various ways.
It would be prudent to back off my high standard and relax a bit, but it's so nice to achieve a glass smooth shave!

Edited to add: I use a safety razor, not a straight.

 

[one2mny]

Barbers don’t generally shave ATG because we try to avoid skin irritation.

At home, I most definitely shave ATG, but not necessarily to chase BBS.

 

[Ravenonrock]

I usually do a single straight razor pass, one and done. Close and comfortable is my preference, not BBS. Not sure how many strokes it takes me, curious now. I will likely forget I’m counting mid shave though. Likely more than 14 I figure.

 

[gpjoe]

I usually do a single straight razor pass, one and done. Close and comfortable is my preference, not BBS. Not sure how many strokes it takes me, curious now. I will likely forget I’m counting mid shave though. Likely more than 14 I figure.

Yeah, the "14 -Stroke Shave" assumes 14 perfect strokes, which I'm guessing rarely happens. Still, your approach seems to be very much in line with a typical barber shave. Clean, close, and comfortable.

 

[Alex Jr]

I used to. I don’t anymore. Not worth it. Skin feels better, healthier and I can use all razors from mild to aggressive the same way, no need to change technique.

I stopped ATG and started focusing on a more efficient WTG/XTG or even 2 WTG passes, like a barber would.

It was weird first, like the shave was incomplete. It’s amazing how you adapt your technique and the results start showing.

 

[gpjoe]

I used to. I don’t anymore. Not worth it. Skin feels better, healthier and I can use all razors from mild to aggressive the same way, no need to change technique.

I stopped ATG and started focusing on a more efficient WTG/XTG or even 2 WTG passes, like a barber would.

It was weird first, like the shave was incomplete. It’s amazing how you adapt your technique and the results start showing.

Doing an ATG final pass with my DE or Feather shavette gets me 90% BBS with little irritation. Chasing the last 10% is trouble and I've abandoned it.

When I shaved with carts it was a single pass, north to south and done.

 

[nlife]

I used to chase it when I first started. Even though I shoot for the more obtainable close, comfortable shave, I'm always a little disappointed when I'm so close to a BBS, BUT then the chief shave inspector (my wife) finds a spot that I missed. The spot is usually along my left jaw line.

I don't need BBS, but I'd like to get my technique down to the point where I can get really dang close to it while still having a comfortable shave and only using three passes.

 

[Darth Scandalous]

There was some good discussion on this a while back in the General Shaving area.

How Did the Three Pass Shave Originate? One or Two Passes Were Standard Historically.

Curious as to the origination of today's recommended three pass DE shave with, across and against the grain? Is anyone familiar with the basis for this? My attempt to research the topic hasn't found any historical basis for this beyond the more recent posts and videos from DE shavers who...

www.badgerandblade.com

If I had to guess, a lot of gents over the years shaved as close as they could comfortably-- how close and how many passes would depend on their whiskers, their skin, their tools, and their needs. Personally I can get to near BBS with no drama now so I usually do, because my hair grows fast and I like feeling smooth for most of the day. That wasn't the case when I started straight shaving and wasn't usually the case when I was using other tools so I settled on SAS/DFS, basically as good as I could get with the tools I had, without irritation.

 

[gpjoe]

There was some good discussion on this a while back in the General Shaving area.

How Did the Three Pass Shave Originate? One or Two Passes Were Standard Historically.

Curious as to the origination of today's recommended three pass DE shave with, across and against the grain? Is anyone familiar with the basis for this? My attempt to research the topic hasn't found any historical basis for this beyond the more recent posts and videos from DE shavers who...

www.badgerandblade.com

If I had to guess, a lot of gents over the years shaved as close as they could comfortably-- how close and how many passes would depend on their whiskers, their skin, their tools, and their needs. Personally I can get to near BBS with no drama now so I usually do, because my hair grows fast and I like feeling smooth for most of the day. That wasn't the case when I started straight shaving and wasn't usually the case when I was using other tools so I settled on SAS/DFS, basically as good as I could get with the tools I had, without irritation.

Good stuff and I agree about the tools.

Seems like (generally) the introduction of the safety razor allowed most men to get a very close shave with less effort and less focus than with an open blade. Progress?

Still, it seems that many men today are able to get BBS shaves using straight razors from the 1800's...the actual, same tool. So I suppose I'm wondering how prevalent the pursuit of BBS was back then...as compared to today.

I guess we'll never know.

It is complete conjecture on my part, but I suspect that chasing a BBS shave is a relatively new phenomenon.

 

[SliceOfLife]

If your edges are good enough you can get a good ATG pass and BBS results without irritation; it's nice to do. If the edges aren't good enough and you're accepting irritation to get that close... it's not worth it.

Not everyone had a Thuri or high end Coti back in the day. A lot of folks were using pretty mediocre barbers synths; or going ages between getting the razor honed by someone else... so yeah they probably skipped ATG passes; unless they were masochists. Folks that got spendy on a nice hone like an Escher had the option; but did they bother? Who knows.

 

[Darth Scandalous]

Still, it seems that many men today are able to get BBS shaves using straight razors from the 1800's...the actual, same tool. So I suppose I'm wondering how prevalent the pursuit of BBS was back then...as compared to today.

Well, it would also depend on what they had available for honing, and their skills in that regard. And that's assuming a self shave. As noted above, a barber probably wouldn't be going for BBS unless he knew you and your skin tendencies well, and maybe not even then.

 

[Butch Waxx]

For almost 4 and a half decades my daily shave was pretty much:
• As fast as possible before work.
• A Cartridge razor of some type.
• Afta balm with Mennen Skin bracer
• OUTTA THERE.
A BBS was NEVER EVER considered, just something socially acceptable for the office and “after hours”.

Now days I have more TIME for a shave, (most days), along with a selection of razor and blade combinations which make it easier to get those extra smooth results if desired. I enjoy tinkering with the toys much like a midnight mechanic on pit row just to see if I can get 1 more MPH out of it!

 

[gpjoe]

For almost 4 and a half decades my daily shave was pretty much:
• As fast as possible before work.
• A Cartridge razor of some type.
• Afta balm with Mennen Skin bracer
• OUTTA THERE.
A BBS was NEVER EVER considered, just something socially acceptable for the office and “after hours”.

Now days I have more TIME for a shave, (most days), along with a selection of razor and blade combinations which make it easier to get those extra smooth results if desired. I enjoy tinkering with the toys much like a midnight mechanic on pit row just to see if I can get 1 more MPH out of it!

I suppose it's a combination of things, including tools, time, desire, and a dose of "because and I can" determination.

 

[gpjoe]

And again, much conjecture and supposition on my part but I'm guessing the average guy back then (late 19th, early 20th century) was merely looking for a SAS, and embracing a move to the safety razor.

Not implying one being superior to the other, just assuming that it made shaving less complex and less of a chore...and thus more appealing to the masses.

I don't like quartz watches but the introduction of the battery-operated-marvel-of-modern-science nearly drove mechanical watches to extinction...same with fountain pens (ballpoint), vinyl records (CD/mp3), and tube amplifiers (transistors).

I think the masses still generally prefer cheap, fast, and easy...whether a socially acceptable shave or a ballpoint pen.

So maybe that's my answer: the BBS shave isn't really an obsession outside the ranks of a very small group of traditional wet shavers.

 

[NorthernSoul]

In earlier times, the goal for most people was to be socially presentable during the work day. If your shave was close enough, you could avoid the dreaded "5 o'clock shadow", "looking like a bum", etc.

The BBS idea I think is a combination of hobbyist perfectionism and interest in getting as close a possible with the skills and equipment you have acquired. Some people say it started with Charles Roberts and Method Shaving. Not sure on that, but for sure it is a hobbyist and/or perfectionist thing.

 

[Alum of Potash]

I grew up with a father who was an officer in the US army. As such, he had to be shaved each day and I don't think I ever saw him unshaven for a day in my life. But he had a very heavy beard, which I've inherited, so there was always a hint of shadow there, never anything like BBS. As a young man, I sort of did what he did, one pass with a double-bladed Atra cartridge and some canned goo and that was it. Everything was WTG apart from some ATG work at the base of my neck often leading to weepers and irritation there. If I nicked myself, I never really new why, and changing cartridges was sort of akin to, heck, the razor's not shaving anymore. And that was that.

As a middle-aged man, I discovered the wonderful world of wet-shaving in 2011 and moved to straights shortly afterwards. Yet the hunt for BBS is not just limited to straights. Here I learned that one was not limited to one pass, WTG by default, and that there were all these soaps, creams, blades, hones, and stones that would help me to achieve BBS, a smooth face with no hint of stubble. And it worked. I no longer had to always walk around with a hint of stubble like my father did. But the shaving session was much longer, perhaps as much as three times longer than it was before.

But I became tired of shaving every day like that. Instead of shaving every day, I moved to shaving every other day, and now, I tend to shave every three days or so. Thankfully, I do not have a job that insists that I be clean-shaving before heading out, and society in general has become far more tolerant of a little bit of beard growth than it was in the days of my youth and before.

I'm of the opinion that a straight razor functions well on the first pass with a bit of beard growth, which is one of the reasons I started to shave every three days or so. And in shaving every three days, that means that I'm entitled to spend three times as much time chasing the BBS shave than I would be if shaving every day for perfunctory reasons, if that makes sense.

More recently, I've been using safety razors and shavettes with industrially-made disposable blades. There, I know I could shave every day with them in changing blades frequently, which makes me wonder, did the impetus to shave everyday coincide with the introduction of DE blades or disposable blades?

 

[NorthernSoul]

...More recently, I've been using safety razors and shavettes with industrially-made disposable blades. There, I know I could shave every day with them in changing blades frequently, which makes me wonder, did the impetus to shave everyday coincide with the introduction of DE blades or disposable blades?

I think it came from men's experience in the military. Daily shaving was expected, but you didn't have very much time. Safety razors and disposable blades fits right into those requirements.

 

[Alum of Potash]

I think it came from men's experience in the military. Daily shaving was expected, but you didn't have very much time. Safety razors and disposable blades fits right into those requirements.

Interesting. Sounds like we are dealing with a military culture by default then...

 

[MrFritz]

I kind of think it goes along with just trying to get the best possible shave one can get. The Pinnacle.
And if absolutely NO HAIR is left - then that is achieved.
I would attempt for it more if my face could handle it.
I have learned that even XTG is going to cause me issues.
My goal is a very good DFS.

THEN I think that part of it is the forums and youtube videos and etc with most shavers doing 3 pass BBS type shaves. It has also just become the "thing to do."

My grandfather said he used canned goo and a superspeed one pass WTG and it was all that he needed for that time period.

THEN there are the guys who are "Bigger is Better", the more aggressive the razor, the better. It just simply isn't GOOD ENOUGH if it isn't BBS every time, even if it tears their faces up doing it. MUST be the sharpest Feather.

I realized VERY QUICKLY that BBS was sadly a possible trip to the health clinic LOL, but I envy those that have the skin/face to consistently do it