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Is Wholly Kaw's lather supposed to be this thick?

I shaved yesterday with Wholly Kaw. I loaded up my SOC boar pretty aggressively, and lathered on my dripping wet face.

The lather was very much thicker than I thought it would be. I tried dipping the end of the brush in a bit of water and working that in, but it only seemed to marginally thin it. A bit of more water, and no improvement, then a third visit to the water collapsed the lather into running suds...

Loaded some more soap on the brush, and the lather was very much like when I first loaded. It seemed to rinse off the razor pretty easily, and didn't feel sticky or dry. It was slick, but unnervingly "goo-ey" and thick.

I like the post shave feel, and maybe this is just the way it's supposed to be, but I have myself wondering if I am using this stuff right.
 
Usually with soap like Wholly Kaw, if it’s that slimy and thick, you’ve loaded for too long. Try decreasing your load time. I only load Wholly Kaw for about 20 seconds. If I load for a lot longer, it’s hard to make it work because it’s too thick.
 
WK is a top top soap, once you dial in you will be very happy

Absolutely. As with B&M Reserve, soaking in the soap quantity is key. I usually go for 20 gentle swirls to load the brush. If you’re bearing down with a boar brush then you probably only need a few.
 
Load very lightly and see what happens. It's easier to add more soap if you need it than get enough water into the brush if you have too much soap on it when you face lather.

Modern soaps tend to load very quickly, a few seconds with a wet brush is enough. Heavy loading makes sticky, thick lather that isn't very slick.
 
As others have said probably overloading the brush. I've got a WH sampler and find it lathers/loads up crazy fast like Tabac in that I basically count to 3 while working it with the brush and call it good. Even compared to Sterling Soap it loads more quickly/heavily. Also, I've found that lathering off the soap on either your face directly or in a separate mug/jar seems to help with this overloading as well
 
I looked up the ingredients, and Wholly Kaw is very similar to my shaving soaps except they use castor oil instead of coconut oil and I don't use kokum butter. They will load quite quickly and you don't need much soap to get good lather, especially if you want wet lather.

Tabac, Haslingers, and other "traditional" soaps are very similar in behavior.
 
I never had a problem with WK's soap but then again I am always using a synthetic brush which I find makes it easy for me to dial in how much I need. This is just me, but with boar brushes I do tend to overload. If you have other brushes, synthetic even, try and see, maybe it would give you a different result.
 
I looked up the ingredients, and Wholly Kaw is very similar to my shaving soaps except they use castor oil instead of coconut oil and I don't use kokum butter. They will load quite quickly and you don't need much soap to get good lather, especially if you want wet lather.

Tabac, Haslingers, and other "traditional" soaps are very similar in behavior.

Please advise. Where can I find your soap?
 
Lol, my soap is made for me, currently not for sale. The basic ingredient list is what I recommend for shaving soap, and is probably similar to a number of commercially available soaps.
 
Yep, much lighter loading and all is right with the world. Thanks for the help fella's!
 
WK Donkey Milk is pretty soft as are Barrister and Mann Reserve and quite a few artisan soaps these days. It is easy to overload your brush with both. WK and many others are VERY Thirsty soaps. If you load too much soap on your brush, it will be difficult to add sufficient water to get the soaps properly hydrated for a wonderfully slick, protective lather. Thus, I do not recommend loading directly from the tub with any of the soft soaps.

I typically bowl lather and scoop about 1/2 teaspoon of soap into the bowl and add 1 Tablespoon of water to start the lathering process. Then I add addition water a few drops at a time until the lather is properly hydrated. After a few shaves you will know the proper amount of soap and water needed to hit the sweet spot. If you face lather, scoop out the right amount of soap using your finger or small spoon (I have found that an ice cream sample spoon is ideal) and press the soap into the center of of damp (not wet brush). Then start lathering. The lather will be thick and pasty at first, but keep adding water by dipping the tips of the brush in water until the lather becomes smooth, creamy and glossy. You are looking for lather that has the consistency of Greek yogurt, smooth, dense, and creamy. One of the tests I use for hydration is to check how the lather sticks to your razor. If you dip a soap-covered razor into a glass of water and the lather sticks to the razor, you need to add more water to your lather. If the lather dissipates, you have too much water and need to add a little more soap. If most of the lather leaves the razor and floats to the top of the glass, you have your lather properly hydrated.

I suggest watching some of the soap review videos by either Jason Rudman (Ruds Shaves), Michael Freedberg. or Chris Maden (Another Cut Above). They seem to do a good job of hydrating lathers.
 
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