I recently posted that the lather I get from Stirling Soaps is adequate but not great. I was lathering it with a Simpson badger brush like I always do with my other soaps. My brush can hold a large volume of water so I started shaking it out more than I usually do and was rewarded with a much thicker lather. Not just adequate anymore. If anyone is having the problem I had, give this a try.
Stirling Soap Lather
- Thread starter smu
- Start date
It's been about 4yrs now since I've had a badger brush but from what I can remember that my lathers with Stirling took me a minute to dial in because its all about loading and adding water on the go. I have been 100% synthetic brushes and 100% Stirling for that time because I found that starting with a damp synthetic seemed to pick soap up better off the puck and as I add water to the brush as I face lather worked best so the badger brush had to go and I've never had a problem with lathering a Stirling soap since...
I find the same is true for my brushes, be it badger, boar, horse or synthetic…damp. I soak, then shake, so the brush is damp and add water on the fly. No problems face lathering with the soaps I’m using.
I never had a problem face-lathering with Stirling soaps. I just had a great shave lathering MITA with a Simpson 3-band. They work as well as my Thater & Shavemac 2-bands. However, I hate a wet lather. I shake my brush out and paint my face like a mime. If it's too dry, I add water by dribbling it onto the puck or brush with my fingers.
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Whether I'm using my Wee Scot or my Maggards Travel Synthetic, I always shake the brush out so it's just damp before loading on the soap. Usually only takes a very small amount of added water to get to a great lather from there.
I’m always curious how people get this to work for them. If I don’t go at the soap (any) without a soppy wet brush, it just takes me forever to get a good load and lathering it afterwards is even more work! Maybe it’s my water, who knows.
A lot of this has to do with the water itself. Soft water has lower levels of magnesium and calcium. You can get a water tester that tests PPM or TDS (parts per million) or (total dissolved solids). If you are in the 400-600 TDS range I would say it's likely the water. If you don't want to spend the money on a tester, if you have a water filter like a Brita or a Zero Water on hand, I would suggest trying it with that water. If this solves the problem you can get a water softener for your house (highly suggested just for general health and skin) or you can install an ion exchange filter for your sink to soften it up a bit.
This is the same process that water softeners use, which is why the salt is not actually added to the water, but rather replaces the material needed in the resins for the ion exchange process. This is why a high efficiency water softener is important. You can install one yourself for about 400 bucks with some hunting, you'll use about 10 bags a year with a HE unit. Not all TDS is bad or bad for you, but having less never hurts, and I bet it might help your lather.
City water, well water, and aquifer water can all make a difference. Different water treatment plants add different amounts of chemicals and have different treatment methods. With my limited experience and the project I did in one of my wastewater classes, city water is higher in contaminates than other methods. You can view your specific water quality report (which is another alternative to buying a tester) to see the quality of the water for your area, which is public record.
I have Stirling Margaritas in the Artic, and it lathers like a dream with soft water, and really takes some work using the same brush before installing a water softener. I hope this helps a bit.
And I should mention that filtering water doesn't make it "softer", rather it takes out many of the contaminants that make it "hard".
You can usually get water testing historical data from the municipality/water supplier. At least in Canada that's all required to be public record anyways. Just go on your city/district/etc website and find their general contact email. Might take a week or two to get a response as they bounce it down the ladder until someone that knows finally gets it, but you should get the info.
You can also estimate it based on the water source your supplier uses. If it's groundwater (any kind of well), it'll probably have higher hardness, like 100ppm or more. Sometimes a lot more. If it's surface water (river or lake), it'll probably have quite low hardness. My city for example, primarily uses deep wells and our hardness varies from 180 to 250-ish, depending which well(s) are running at the time.
You can also estimate it based on the water source your supplier uses. If it's groundwater (any kind of well), it'll probably have higher hardness, like 100ppm or more. Sometimes a lot more. If it's surface water (river or lake), it'll probably have quite low hardness. My city for example, primarily uses deep wells and our hardness varies from 180 to 250-ish, depending which well(s) are running at the time.
Yep, it's a similar process in the US as well. Many of these reports are available online on the municipal or city website as well. And yes, groundwater is a higher hardness, with much more iron and minerals dissolved in the water. Just from my experience traveling with shaving soaps, softer water whips up a lather easier. Do you think it makes a difference?
Depends on the soap. Some are less sensitive to hardness than others. I don't really have any problem lathering Tabac, Stirling's mutton base, Canada Shaving Soap, La Toja, Speick, or Sapponificino Varesino Tundra Artica in my town's fairly hard water. Can't speak for any other soaps cause I just haven't tried em, hehe.
Thats fair, ive tried a few but my go tos are Stirling and Poraso. Im happy with them and they work for me. Im interested in that Canada Shaving Soap though. Every product that I've had from Canada rocks.
If only we could try them all hehe
Or I could just load with a wetter brush and not really worry about it lol
What type of brush are you using? Badger, Boar, or Synth? Soft and floppy or do they have some backbone to them? This all is very important to a good quality lather, not just how hard or how soft your water is...
They’re all the same it doesn’t matter what the brush or type is. I just make sure whatever I’m using is soaking wet before I go at the soap. It’s basically the Marco Method and works very quickly for me opposed to starting with a barely wet brush, as it takes me forever to get from point A to point B this way.
Great advice- and this holds true with other things that aren't quite working for ya. Just try something different.
Chandu
I Waxed The Badger.
I've never had any lather problems, just scent problems. Too strong.
Always whips up a nice thick lather with little effort for me. I do have a water softener. That might help
With the exception of their mutton tallow soaps, I've always found Stirling soaps to be a little anemic on the lather. Will make sure to try and get rid of the extra moisture next time.
my well went hard(er) and I went to distilled water. that was hard to figure out a lather with, so went to normal bottled water for about a year. regular bottled water was much easier to lather with. then I just started working with my well water to figure it out. hard water takes more soap loading. I use a wet, not damp brush generally and face lather. now it's simply an unconscious process. drain some water out of the brush and load, then go to my face and build it generally without having to add more water. and I use a wetter lather as a straight shaver.
1-3 inches of rain will soften my water for a day or three, generally the next day after a rain. more rain will last longer.
I used to travel a lot, and would see various hardnesses when I did. once I figured out my water, anywhere was easy. soft water became a treat, except in the shower. city water is always a varying degree of softer. my dad's is extremely soft by comparison.
most of my soaps are still tallow and I use MWF, Mike's, Speick, Hasslingers (tallow and veggie, no change), Williams new and Sterling's mutton sampler mix (two samples and a full puck. it's actually an impressive lather now, and easy to build. I won't redo the experiment, but I'll use it up). I use pucks of the above at home, sticked on the road.
hard water without a softener isn't the end of the world if you learn it.
I can't remember having issues lathering up Sterling, but I've only tried samples over the years and various iterations. I've always liked the base, and hated the scents either on their merits, or because of their strength of scent. the muttons were the latest, a pine and unscented. the pine is also too strong for my taste, hence the Williams experiment because I'm not a fan of Williams on it's own as harder to lather than MWF and drying my skin post shave.
1-3 inches of rain will soften my water for a day or three, generally the next day after a rain. more rain will last longer.
I used to travel a lot, and would see various hardnesses when I did. once I figured out my water, anywhere was easy. soft water became a treat, except in the shower. city water is always a varying degree of softer. my dad's is extremely soft by comparison.
most of my soaps are still tallow and I use MWF, Mike's, Speick, Hasslingers (tallow and veggie, no change), Williams new and Sterling's mutton sampler mix (two samples and a full puck. it's actually an impressive lather now, and easy to build. I won't redo the experiment, but I'll use it up). I use pucks of the above at home, sticked on the road.
hard water without a softener isn't the end of the world if you learn it.
I can't remember having issues lathering up Sterling, but I've only tried samples over the years and various iterations. I've always liked the base, and hated the scents either on their merits, or because of their strength of scent. the muttons were the latest, a pine and unscented. the pine is also too strong for my taste, hence the Williams experiment because I'm not a fan of Williams on it's own as harder to lather than MWF and drying my skin post shave.
