Penhaligons English Fern - help with reformulation

[rand77]

I had the pleasure of owing a tallow and modern reformulation of the legendary Penhaligons English Fern. The tallow edition is legendary - its an amazing product in many respects, from which they should not have deviated from. I'm having a bit of trouble with the modern version (non-tallow), which appears to be a stunningly terrible soap. I think at this point I can get a better lather out of pretty much anything else - even a puck of Williams! Hopefully someone can provide from pointers for this soap because the scent is quite good. I've given it several tries, and here is how it went:

1. First I soaked the top of the puck and brush with warm water for ~2 minutes. I'm using a brush with a TGN knot which has a fair amount of backbone. It tears though every other soap I own.
2. Loaded heavily for 45 seconds, deposited the "proto lather" in a bowl, and went back to the puck for 30 seconds more



3. Then took it to the bowl and added few drops of water as I went along. It didn't seem to require much water, as the proto-lather itself was breaking down. Here are the end results:

 

[Gingerbread]

I've gotten better lather from my bar soap. Burn it.

 

[rand77]

I've gotten better lather from my bar soap. Burn it.

Same, I got similar results when I accidentally tried lathering the MdC bath bar sample.

 

[sarimento1]

I tried to replicate your experiment.
Perhaps a case of YMMV.
Not the greatest, richest lather, but it seemed quite ok.
I left it sit for about 5 minutes, then gave it a few more whips of the brush, Simpson Chubby to get 'best possible' results.
And a couple more drops of water.
There was a bit of drying, not terrible, just IMO.
What I look for from this soap, however, is not exceptional lather, but rather acceptable lather with exceptional EF fougere scent.
And from a scent standpoint, it was indeed quite a nice fougere.
Now, I would admit, overall not on par with the tallow formula.
And probably a couple notches below current formula BB cream, overall.
But, OK. So, I won't burn mine.

 

[lt114]

I've heard that some people grate a Palmolive shave stick with a puck of the new English Fern and that works well.

 

[MickToley]

I tried to replicate your experiment.


View attachment 346092

I get something like this with the modern version. Not the greatest, but it's okay.

 

[rand77]

I tried to replicate your experiment.
Perhaps a case of YMMV.
Not the greatest, richest lather, but it seemed quite ok.
I left it sit for about 5 minutes, then gave it a few more whips of the brush, Simpson Chubby to get 'best possible' results.
And a couple more drops of water.
There was a bit of drying, not terrible, just IMO.
What I look for from this soap, however, is not exceptional lather, but rather acceptable lather with exceptional EF fougere scent.
And from a scent standpoint, it was indeed quite a nice fougere.
Now, I would admit, overall not on par with the tallow formula.
And probably a couple notches below current formula BB cream, overall.
But, OK. So, I won't burn mine.

View attachment 346092

Thanks, it appears that I have some work to do, your lather seems to be pretty good. I need to find the right technique to bring out the best of this soap.

The scent is exceptional so I really want this to work out. For a $30 puck it should be far easier to lather though.

 

[rand77]

I've heard that some people grate a Palmolive shave stick with a puck of the new English Fern and that works well.

Thanks, I'll try grating the soap as a last resort. I've found that grating the soap makes loading a bit easier (I've grated Institute Karite and it made it much easier to lather).

 

[Craig_From_Cincy]

I had a modern Blenheim Bouquet soap and try as I may I could only get a mediocre lather from the soap at best. The lather had decent cushion but it was a dry lather with little glide. I finally tossed it. I got a vintage tallow EF from Phil a couple of weeks ago and its glorious, the best lathering soap I've ever used. This is going to spoil me for ever buying a modern Penhaligon's soap.

 

[djh]

Toss it into the shower.

Grab yourself a proper shave soap.

 

[kingfisher]

Sadly, your story is not a new one.

 

[sarimento1]

I went ahead and shaved with the (current) EF soap.
I did add couple drops of glycerin however.
Lather held up ok, although the nice scent was fading.
Saving grace was a splash of EF EDT afterwards.
My conclusion...the new soaps are ok, but I prefer Pen's creams.
And their frags, of course.

 

[rand77]

I went ahead and shaved with the (current) EF soap.
I did add couple drops of glycerin however.
Lather held up ok, although the nice scent was fading.
Saving grace was a splash of EF EDT afterwards.
My conclusion...the new soaps are ok, but I prefer Pen's creams.
And their frags, of course.

Thanks, I'll give it a try, I have a small bottle of glycerine lying around.

I didn't have high expectations for this soap (performance wise), but this is a really REALLY bad reformulation. Compared to the tallow version its night and day.

 

[rand77]

I've had the chance to play with it some more, and have been able to get acceptable lather - just barely acceptable enough to shave with. A few drop of glycerine helps, but not by much.

Another interesting solution that has worked for me is to mix it with MdC. I lather MdC lightly and deposit the lather in a bowl. Then I load from the puck of EF heavily. The scent of EF dominates and the final lather turns out to be outstanding.

Edit: I tried La Toja stick with mixed with the EF, and this also works well and I can only smell the EF. Looks like it needs some outside help to reach its potential.

 

[mharris127]

Rand, I would learn from the purchase and try to use it in the shower. From your lather pictures it looks like it would do OK in the shower or at the sink as a hand soap.

If you really like the smell maybe Pen's has a cream that smells similar. Most of the large British brands use Creighton's cream as a base and mix scenting perfumes into the cream to create the desired scent. Creighton's actually makes a pretty good cream, the only thing I will say is that it is thirsty (compared to Arko creams) so it may require more water than you expect.

 

[rand77]

Rand, I would learn from the purchase and try to use it in the shower. From your lather pictures it looks like it would do OK in the shower or at the sink as a hand soap.

If you really like the smell maybe Pen's has a cream that smells similar. Most of the large British brands use Creighton's cream as a base and mix scenting perfumes into the cream to create the desired scent. Creighton's actually makes a pretty good cream, the only thing I will say is that it is thirsty (compared to Arko creams) so it may require more water than you expect.

I grated the puck of pens, along with a stick of La Toja. I mixed the gratings and compressed them into my soap bowl. It actually works pretty well, and the scent is still English Fern.