I suppose this have been discussed before, just wanted to post my observations. Where I live, I'm blessed with good pure, soft water, and I can get everything to lather very well. Lately, I spent 10 days in London and Paris, which both have hard water. I've been to places with hard water many times before, but always for 1-3 days and not having much time to observe properly the effect of water hardness. This time I could track it .
There are two things, first lathering becoms much tougher in hard water. I had my trusty bowl of Kent shaving soap (fantastic product IMO), which at home lathers like a bomb with just 20-30 seconds of brush loading. When hard water was used, I had to load the brush for much longer and never got this shiny and creamy lather I'm used to. Second, it was the feel and quality of shave. No matter what I did the blade didn't glide well. It felt like I'm using lesser quality or duller blades. Brand new Super Iridium felt like well used Derby or Wilkinson. At the same time, I couldn't get as close a shave as at home. It is well-known that water hardness is detrimental to shaving, I just did not believe that is so bad. In short, for those of you that have hard water, you should at least try to shave using demineralized water. This may and your search for the best soap or the smoothest blade.
There are two things, first lathering becoms much tougher in hard water. I had my trusty bowl of Kent shaving soap (fantastic product IMO), which at home lathers like a bomb with just 20-30 seconds of brush loading. When hard water was used, I had to load the brush for much longer and never got this shiny and creamy lather I'm used to. Second, it was the feel and quality of shave. No matter what I did the blade didn't glide well. It felt like I'm using lesser quality or duller blades. Brand new Super Iridium felt like well used Derby or Wilkinson. At the same time, I couldn't get as close a shave as at home. It is well-known that water hardness is detrimental to shaving, I just did not believe that is so bad. In short, for those of you that have hard water, you should at least try to shave using demineralized water. This may and your search for the best soap or the smoothest blade.
