I've only used this when shaving with bar soap. Some of them actually do work decently for shaving.
Palm Lathering?
- Thread starter Alum of Potash
- Start date
I'm now back to palm lathering as well.
I started with palm lathering for about three years and then switched to face lathering. That switch went okay but I am finding that I still prefer palm lathering for some soaps. In the summer I was using MdC Rose. As everyone knows, MdC is so easy to lather that building a lather on the face is easy and quick. However, with the start of fall, I've switched to using DRH Marlborough. DRH is a little harder for me to optimize and it takes longer to build the lather that I want. So now I am palm lathering again to build just the right quality of lather for 4+ passes. My favorite palm lathering brush is the SOC boar. When I finish with the DRH puck, I'm going to go to Stirling. I suspect that Stirling is easy to face lather so I'll start with that technique first.
- Thread starter
- #43
Thank you for your remarks. I suppose some of this has to do with hand size, this varying from person to person. I have what I would style average-sized hands, and the knot dimensions of an SOC seem a bit large for me. By way of comparison, the Semogue 1438 boar works for me, but I really prefer the 2020 as I can scrunch up on the knot. Stirling, being a softer soap, should work well with face-lathering if you are so inclined.
I would style palm-lathering as a middle road between bowl-lathering and face-lathering. I have never preferred face-lathering because for me, the lathering mostly occurs in an isolated area below my jawline, followed by a different approach on the rest of my face. It all seems rather asymmetrical. Further, with face-lathering, I am limited to higher-end badger knots (best, two-band, silvertip), broken-in boars, and whatever stray synth has the muster to do the trick. Bowl-lathering seems more elegant in comparison, building the lather in a bowl in advance and allowing me to use larger boar knots, larger pure badger knots, and horse knots which are pretty much a no-go for face-lathering for me.
So with palm-lathering I sort of have both, the condition being that I use smaller knots. These can be prickly pure badgers, horse knots, boars, and of course higher end two-bands and silvertips. Trick is to find the knot that can keep the lather as starting out with a dollop of cream or as loaded from a hard soap or croap on the palm of the hand during initial development for the first pass and then hold enough lather for a second pass plus touch-ups.
For now, I take the Simpson Beaufort line as my benchmark. This series of brushes is loaded with fairly prickly pure badger, not something I would want to use for face-lathering. But in the palm or on a hard cake of soap, they are very effective. Paint-lathering afterwards on the face is not an issue. I have the Beaufort B1, B2, and B3 brushes. At 18-19mm x 41-42mm as measured by my caliper, the B1 knot does well in keeping the lather on the palm, but is hard-pressed to deliver the goods at the final touch-up stage in shaving, although it can be done. The B2 knot, measuring 19-20mm x 46-47mm, is a little harder to contain on the palm, but easily holds enough for the final shaving touch-ups. So my vote goes for the B2. The B3, measuring 20mm x 49mm, also will do the job but is essentially overkill. The Semogue 2020, by way of comparison, has a 21-22mm x 52-53mm knot, but as the it is not as densely filled as the Simpson Beauforts, when scrunched up at the tip, it is acting more like the Beaufort 2. Later, after the lather has started to develop, one can back off from scrunching up the bristles and allow the longer, looser loft to do its thing more gently. And this is why it works as well, if not better than, the Beaufort B2 in my opinion.
Funny enough, it was my wife's suggestion that we walk into the Art of Shaving store at the mall nearby. I had been using carts for something like 40 years up to that point. So the saleswoman showed us how to build a lather using her palm. My wife bought me a shaving travel kit with some software and a brush. I took it home, plan lathered it once, thought it was too messy and limiting and proceeded to acquire and accumulate a number of lather bowls.
It's been at least 2 years now that I've been palm lathering all my creams. It works out beautifully. Highly recommended. 
Interesting brush analysis. I actually don't own any medium size brushes. I've been meaning to get some but am waiting for one of my brushes to die first. I am currently using the Duke 3 / 59 / SOC boar as my big brushes and my little brush is the Wee Scot. I can see where it can get messy with lather getting out of your palm.
I've always been a many-pass shaver, averaging about four passes every shave. This goes for both DE and straights. I enjoy shaving so much that I try to get as much as I can out of every shave. Because of this requirement, I gravitated to bigger brushes because I needed to be able to build enough lather to cover four passes and hold it all in the brush (I had no bowl or brush stand or anything like that until recently). I guess I got used to monitoring and trying to catch any lather drips that make their way out of my hand, although some inevitably drips into the sink after I load it up with enough water.
My favorite face-lathering brush is my Wee Scot, partly because of your asymmetrical argument. It is so small that I can treat my entire face in basically the same fashion. My main issue with face lathering is that the lather quality really changes throughout a multi-pass shave. For sure the 4th pass lather is way different than the 1st pass lather. To combat this, I run the brush under water and reload it every pass. That gives me similar lather for every pass. It does waste some soap but I am currently on a multi-year journey trying to use up my existing soap collection. I think I still have a year more to go before buying any new ones...
- Thread starter
- #47
It's been at least 2 years now that I've been palm lathering all my creams. It works out beautifully. Highly recommended.
Great, I'll have to look up your threads on the subject. I agree that creams work well for this, and they can be used more sparingly this way. What brushes work best from your experience?
- Thread starter
- #48
I can understand using a larger brush knot for a four-pass shave. Mine are usually two passes plus touch-ups as mentioned. I agree that the quality of the lather changes with face-lathering, with the lather becoming thinner on the second pass and perhaps even thinner during touch-ups from my experience. This is something I appreciate, especially at the touch-up stage, as I like being able to see the remaining whiskers to be addressed (straight-razor shaver here). Bowl-lathering is more static in comparison, with the lather remaining more consistent throughout the shave. Palm-lathering, I find similar to face-lathering, particularly with smaller knots, in that the lather becomes thinner during the second pass and touch-up stages.
I like using badgers with knots that are either moderately dense or very dense. My favourite brands are Simpson and Vulfix.
I don't see the big problem? Load your brush with shaving soap, Lather in your hand. Wipe your hand on your face and then brush like heck until you get where you want to be? Face, bowl, hand, all good IMHO! I like to see what the lather is going to look like before any kind of application to my face.
I palm lather exclusively when I'm traveling. I typically take a few different, little soap samples for variety. Simply squish the needed amount in my palm and lather away. I start by wiping the lather in my hand on my face, then face lather. Works really well and you don't have to haul a full size soap puck or bowl with you. Travel light my friends... its the only way!
not a dedicated palm latherer, but it has provided me the very best lather I've ever had. I just don't like to do it that often.
- Thread starter
- #53
Thanks.
I bowl and face lather, doesn't matter if it's a cream or a soap as far as which way, just whatever I feel like doing at the time. But I do not get palm lathering, just don't see why.
For me, it's a good way to lather if I'm outdoors. Also good for breaking in a new boar brush. I don't have callouses on my face. 
I’ve actually been doing this more frequently over the last week. I love to face lather, but as an everyday shaver my face doesn’t like it so much. I’ve never gotten good consistent lathers from a bowl so I figured I’d give this a shot.
My technique is to build the lather in my palm, and once it’s reached the volume and slickness I prefer, I remove all the excess and work back in the brush. Anything left goes straight to my face, worked in with my hands, then rinse hands and apply lather from the brush and move to shave. I’ve found this takes no more time than face lathering, while still getting the same great lather. I actually am enjoying it.
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My technique is to build the lather in my palm, and once it’s reached the volume and slickness I prefer, I remove all the excess and work back in the brush. Anything left goes straight to my face, worked in with my hands, then rinse hands and apply lather from the brush and move to shave. I’ve found this takes no more time than face lathering, while still getting the same great lather. I actually am enjoying it.
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- Thread starter
- #60
Thank you for your description of your technique. I too will work the excess (i.e., that which risks to spill out of my palm) back into the brush as needed and once the lather is developed, apply what is in my palm with my palm, smoothing it out with the brush. As for making the lather, I start by lightly shaking off the soaked brush, then loading it with cream in my palm or from a briefly soaked puck of soap. After refilling the vessel I used to soak the brush with warmer water, I then dip the tips of the brush in it from time to time to introduce water into the lather. Works very well; and I have only been palm-lathering since starting it, which is to say for most of 2019.
I'm really liking pure badgers for this, applying the lather paint-brush style. I recently ordered a Shavemac configurator brush (no. 82 handle in white) with a 20mm x 46mm pure badger fan knot, and I'm liking it very much. Trick there for me is to scrunch down on the knot about midway with my fingers in starting the lathering process to create a denser effect before backing off to the handle towards the end. Their pure badger is surprisingly soft.
