Introduction
Below is the optimum lather table and review of Nanny's Silly Soap (NSS) Original shaving soap from my lather optimization guide in the ShaveWiki. Please see the guide for an overview, disclaimer, and general information about optimizing lather.
Back in June, @Cal generously donated large samples of NSS Original for evaluation. (Thanks, Cal!) It didn't take long in the optimization process to realize that NSS was going to end up high in my list, but I didn't know how high until the ranking tests. For a long time, Declaration Grooming was #1. DG has now been dethroned. Details are below.
Feedback is welcome.
Optimum Lather Table
PR | Performance Ranking |
PD | Purchase Date (YYYY-MM-DD) |
SCM | Soap/Cream Mass (g) |
WM | Water Mass (g) |
TM | Total Mass (g) = SCM + WM |
WSCR | Water-to-Soap/Cream Ratio = WM / SCM |
SCIT | Soap/Cream-Incorporation Time (s) |
LBT | Lather-Building Time (s) |
SCP | Soap/Cream Price (USD) |
PR | Soap/Cream | PD | SCM | WM | TM | WSCR | SCIT | LBT | SCP |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Nanny's Silly Soap (NSS) Original Shaving Soap | 2017-04-23 | 1.20 | 9.60 | 10.80 | 8 | 30 | 45 | 0.15 |
2 | Declaration Grooming (DG) (Formerly L&L Grooming) Shaving Soap | 2017-08-11 | 0.81 | 8.91 | 9.72 | 11 | 20 | 60 | 0.15 |
3 | Barrister and Mann (B&M) Shaving Soap | 2017-10-19 | 0.71 | 8.52 | 9.23 | 12 | 25 | 30 | 0.12 |
4 | Cold River Soap Works (CRSW) SELECT Shaving Soap | 2017-12-15 | 0.86 | 9.46 | 10.32 | 11 | 6 | 60 | 0.15 |
5 | Stirling Soap Co. Shave Soap | 2017-08-14 | 0.53 | 9.01 | 9.54 | 17 | 20 | 30 | 0.04 |
6 | Barrister's Reserve Shaving Soap | 2017-06 | 0.96 | 11.52 | 12.48 | 12 | 45 | 60 | 0.15 |
7 | Mike's Natural Shaving Soap | 2017-09 | 0.75 | 9.00 | 9.75 | 12 | 60 | 60 | 0.07 |
8 | Barrister and Mann (B&M) Latha Shaving Soap (Discontinued) | 2018-01-30 | 0.75 | 9.75 | 10.50 | 13 | 10 | 30 | 0.07 |
9 | The Art of Shaving (AOS) Shaving Cream | 2018-01-03 | 1.00 | 7.00 | 8.00 | 7 | 3 | 45 | 0.19 |
10 | Mystic Water (MW) Shaving Soap | 2018-01-27 | 0.70 | 9.10 | 9.80 | 13 | 30 | 30 | 0.07 |
11 | The Sudsy Soapery Shave Soap | 2018-02-05 | 0.46 | 8.28 | 8.74 | 18 | 10 | 60 | 0.05 |
Nanny's Silly Soap (NSS) Original Shaving Soap
Top label, bottom label with ingredient list, and close-up of soap in small jar
Version Name: Vetyver [French for "Vetiver"]
Purchase Date: April 23, 2017. A sample was received on June 16, 2018, from @Cal, who generously donated the soap for evaluation. The sample was then placed in a small jar and photographed. Photographs of the original container were taken by Cal. Cal also donated a sample with photographs of the unscented version that was purchased on the same day as the vetiver version, but since it turned out that the unscented soap had taken on significant grittiness that affected lather building, particularly lather-building time, my evaluation narrowed down to only concerning the vetiver sample.
Review Period: August 20 to September 7, 2018. 15 optimization shaves and 2 ranking tests.
Manufacturing Location: Stourbridge, England, UK
Ingredients: Aqua, potassium palmitate, sodium palmitate, potassium stearate (vegetable), sodium stearate, potassium cocoabutterate, sodium cocoabutterate, potassium shea butterate, sodium shea butterate, potassium cocoate, sodium cocoate, potassium castorate, sodium castorate, glycerine (vegetable), kaolin, Parfum [parfum being only vetiver essential oil]
Appearance: Orange yellow
Scent: The scent from the vetiver essential oil is described by the soap maker as "woody, smokey and very earthy." This was my first vetiver soap or cream, and I neither loved nor hated the scent.
Hardness: Soft
Optimum Lather Overview: Sheen is okay or pretty good. Lather is not airy and lather has some thickness and yogurt-like behavior of "stringiness" and "peaking", but peaks are somewhat weak. Adhesion is pretty good and application is good. Scent is faintly present during passes. Slickness is very good to great. Cushion/protection is pretty good. Post-shave is very good.
Optimization Details: Optimization was performed with unscented and vetiver samples, but as mentioned above, the vetiver sample became the exclusive sample for fine-tuning results. For the vetiver sample, water-to-soap ratios varied nonsequentially from 7 to 16 and lather-building times varied from 30 seconds to 60 seconds. 60 seconds was capable of making lather with good to very good slickness with an optimum three-pass mass of approximately 9.5 g, but 45 seconds of building resulted in denser lather with more slickness at the expense of only losing a little cushion/protection. (30 seconds resulted in slightly more slickness, but the lather seemed kind of airy with even less cushion/protection.)
Ranking Details: NSS was compared to Declaration Grooming (DG) in sequential shaves. Slickness with NSS's optimum lather was found to be better than with DG's optimum. Cushion/protection was not as good with NSS, but it was close because lather thickness was almost as good. The post-shave with NSS seemed very similar between the two soaps, but the post-shave with NSS seemed a little better. Given the nature of dethroning DG and ranking NSS at the top of my list, two ranking tests were performed between NSS and DG in order to confirm results.