I'm 6 months late in starting a journal so I have a lot of catching up to do. Over these past months, I've made many friends on B&B, learned a lot. Wet shaving has become a very enjoyable endeavor.
I owe my conversion to wet shaving to our youngest son. He sent me some Astra Super Platinum Green blades and a RazoRock Lupo DE Aluminum razor. The blades got to our place first... followed ten day later or so by the Lupo. In the meantime, I read some Amazon reviews and bought some Proraso White shaving soap along with some RR Mudder Focker soap. I had an old Vulfix Super Badger brush laying around from years ago. I still used the latest Gillette cartridge razor but was making my own lather with some drug store soap. I don't remember what brand. I just remember it came in its own little blue shaving bowl with a lid.
He said: "Dad, just try wet shaving. I know you love your Gillette Fusion Power.... but you never know. I won't be upset if you don't like it." He was right. I tried the Proraso White.... didn't like the soap and I didn't like the razor. It felt so light and the shave was pretty awful, truth be told. This was on Feb. 15th, I guess I should add the year.. 2/15/2022.
While I was waiting for the razor to show up, I had started watching YouTube videos so when I had that horrible shave, I had an idea about a different razor. I had watched a lot of Brian Mulreany's videos and thought I wanted an Executive Shaving Outlaw, so I started an email conversation with him and ended up chatting with him on their website. After asking me a few questions, getting a feel for where I was coming from, etc., Brian suggested I try the Claymore Evolution. He said, he'd been using it himself since they got their first shipment from Hong Kong. That sounded good to me. I mean, he was the owner. He could choose from quite a few different razors and that was his choice...
I selected a few more items: a Stef Baxter lipped ceramic shaving bowl, Acca Kappa Barbershop soap, ESC Citrus Kiss cream, the ESC Ultimate G4 shaving brush... Paid extra for premium shipping..... ordered some Feather ProGuards from Amazon.
This long essay takes us up to my first shave with my Claymore Evolution: It is sort of imprinted on my mind. I used the Acca Kappa croap (I didn't even know what that meant until I showed up on B&B LOL). My first bowl lather wasn't all that great. I learned shortly thereafter that I needed to spread the soap thin on the bottom of the bowl before hitting it with my brush, but still, I managed to make enough to lather my face adequately. The very first stroke: I'll never forget. This was on Feb. 18th so I had three days growth. I held the handle parallel to my face, lifted it until I felt the blade engage and did one WTG stroke... a pretty long one. I didn't think it was cutting anything but when I looked at my face first... then the razor head, I was amazed. There was a very clear plow line where the whiskers had been sheared off cleanly. I also noticed, my face was pretty red where the razor had passed. It was immediately apparent: wow, I don't need to bear down on this razor for it to cut through three days of old man, grey whiskers.
I had a few weepers around the corners of my mouth and in the upper chin area but nothing my liquid styptic didn't stop immediately. It was much easier to shave around my nose with the thin head than it was with the single trim blade on my Fusion Power. I did my normal two pass shave: WTG and ATG. When the shave was complete and I rinsed off, I had a closer shave than I'd ever gotten with my Fusion Power. I was a bit surprised.
I'm an every other day shaver most of the time, unless my wife and I have to be somewhere. I always shave before I go out in public. Just a habit, I suppose. Anyway, I had a few shaves under my belt when I found B&B on March 1st. Each shave had been better than the last and I was already feeling comfortable with my new Claymore Evo.
I've been involved in a few online forums prior to B&B so I knew what to expect....sort of. I jumped right in, asking questions, etc. This seems like a natural place to end my first entry.
I owe my conversion to wet shaving to our youngest son. He sent me some Astra Super Platinum Green blades and a RazoRock Lupo DE Aluminum razor. The blades got to our place first... followed ten day later or so by the Lupo. In the meantime, I read some Amazon reviews and bought some Proraso White shaving soap along with some RR Mudder Focker soap. I had an old Vulfix Super Badger brush laying around from years ago. I still used the latest Gillette cartridge razor but was making my own lather with some drug store soap. I don't remember what brand. I just remember it came in its own little blue shaving bowl with a lid.
He said: "Dad, just try wet shaving. I know you love your Gillette Fusion Power.... but you never know. I won't be upset if you don't like it." He was right. I tried the Proraso White.... didn't like the soap and I didn't like the razor. It felt so light and the shave was pretty awful, truth be told. This was on Feb. 15th, I guess I should add the year.. 2/15/2022.
While I was waiting for the razor to show up, I had started watching YouTube videos so when I had that horrible shave, I had an idea about a different razor. I had watched a lot of Brian Mulreany's videos and thought I wanted an Executive Shaving Outlaw, so I started an email conversation with him and ended up chatting with him on their website. After asking me a few questions, getting a feel for where I was coming from, etc., Brian suggested I try the Claymore Evolution. He said, he'd been using it himself since they got their first shipment from Hong Kong. That sounded good to me. I mean, he was the owner. He could choose from quite a few different razors and that was his choice...
I selected a few more items: a Stef Baxter lipped ceramic shaving bowl, Acca Kappa Barbershop soap, ESC Citrus Kiss cream, the ESC Ultimate G4 shaving brush... Paid extra for premium shipping..... ordered some Feather ProGuards from Amazon.
This long essay takes us up to my first shave with my Claymore Evolution: It is sort of imprinted on my mind. I used the Acca Kappa croap (I didn't even know what that meant until I showed up on B&B LOL). My first bowl lather wasn't all that great. I learned shortly thereafter that I needed to spread the soap thin on the bottom of the bowl before hitting it with my brush, but still, I managed to make enough to lather my face adequately. The very first stroke: I'll never forget. This was on Feb. 18th so I had three days growth. I held the handle parallel to my face, lifted it until I felt the blade engage and did one WTG stroke... a pretty long one. I didn't think it was cutting anything but when I looked at my face first... then the razor head, I was amazed. There was a very clear plow line where the whiskers had been sheared off cleanly. I also noticed, my face was pretty red where the razor had passed. It was immediately apparent: wow, I don't need to bear down on this razor for it to cut through three days of old man, grey whiskers.
I had a few weepers around the corners of my mouth and in the upper chin area but nothing my liquid styptic didn't stop immediately. It was much easier to shave around my nose with the thin head than it was with the single trim blade on my Fusion Power. I did my normal two pass shave: WTG and ATG. When the shave was complete and I rinsed off, I had a closer shave than I'd ever gotten with my Fusion Power. I was a bit surprised.
I'm an every other day shaver most of the time, unless my wife and I have to be somewhere. I always shave before I go out in public. Just a habit, I suppose. Anyway, I had a few shaves under my belt when I found B&B on March 1st. Each shave had been better than the last and I was already feeling comfortable with my new Claymore Evo.
I've been involved in a few online forums prior to B&B so I knew what to expect....sort of. I jumped right in, asking questions, etc. This seems like a natural place to end my first entry.