What led you to using straights?

[xMackx]

That's the question, what led you to using straight razors and why you love them? (As detailed as you wish)

For me it was the permanent aspect of having tools last a life time, and a little mojo didn't hurt.

 

[smalltank]

I got bored with DE..plus less irritation and a closer shave with straights after the adjustment to using em

 

[California Pilot]

20 years of irritation (physical and otherwise) with cartridges led me to DE, time spent on B&B led me to explore the world of the straight razor.

 

[coburn]

Natural progression. Cart to DE, curiosity to straight. next I will try obsidian and a spoon?

 

[Sergio70]

Once you are on this forum its just a matter of time.

 

[Kentos]

That "How It's Made" show on the Dovo factory got me started.

 

[wagstaff]

Expense of Mach 3 cartridges, coupled with running into a couple of guys honing when I took a knife sharpening class. Being a hippy who doesn't like the idea of increasing landfill with plastic cartridges. Long run saving money (hah!)

I still don't love them. I use a DE during the week, because I'm not good enough with the straight yet. I grew a goatee so I could stop shaving over the nasty slash I put on my chin my first shave with a straight. But I remain determined. I'm going to go shave with one right now.

 

[Mike H]

For the last twenty years, stored safely in my sock drawer, I have had my wifes grandfathers razors. After joining B&B, it took about 2 months to make the jump to straights. I sent the Red Point off to Larry and the rest is history.

 

[Chico]

Very short answer: this website....

 

[eastrun]

I started using a DE just as a by product of a financial diet. Then my interest was piqued when I discovered B&B. It was an easy transition to Straight shaving....after some digesting of information here. Haven't looked back since. There is a definite learning curve! Learned a lot about shaving, soaps, brushes and strops. My results have been all good, no razor burn, no bumps, and very few wounds. I do really like Mikes Natural Soaps, full hollow ground blades and a good moisturizing after shave. I'm not sure I've saved any money yet.

 

[paco664]

trying to restore the lost art of being manliness....

I got tired of everything being easier faster etc....

 

[Kavik79]

I've always been interested in older things and when I was younger I was into collecting knives. In my mid teens I was working at a place with a flea market next door that I would visit on my breaks and I picked up a few straight razors there.......which, as a stupid kid obsessed with sharp things, I over-paid for and eventually ruined them by using them in ways that would make most people here probably cry

So, a decade or so later I stumbled across them in a box with some knives and decided maybe it was time to get one to use for what it was intended for, and stop spending so much on Mach3 cartridges over and over and over again.

Paid too much for a brand new Fromm, got a cheap Illinois strop and a no-name badger brush and a puck of Williams from a local CVS. The razor came unevenly ground at both spine and edge and with a hooked heel, so I bought a set of nortons and tried to fix it myself, with no clue what I was really doing....got the blade mostly fixed, but at the cost of a LOT of steel from both the edge and the spine. It shaved, but not comfortably. This put me off it for a while and in trying to figure out what went wrong I started spending more time here (something I REALLY wish I had done before making my first purchase)

Now I've got a small pile to restore when I have free time, a strop I love, 3 shave ready razors that combined cost less than that Fromm, 3 brushes I like, 6 different soaps, 3 aftershaves (and a bottle of Floyd Blue on its way this week), the norton set, a DMT8C, a C12K and the Welsh Tri Slate set. Plus I've bought a hammer and mini anvil, coping saws, various slabs of wood, plastic and horn, pins, washers....and a belt/disc sander combo. Yup, good thing I'm not spending $20 on cartridges anymore

 

[bloodyface]

Hi gents

1) I actually started trying to save money - and then I meet you guys.. hahaha
2) I had an idea I would become more macho. Warm wash, preshave, lather, straight, hot wash, cold wash, some kinda cream etc... hahaha

That is the worst scenario i my life - complete lack of sense of reality -

And I like...

Richardt

 

[dpmtherrien]

I was looking for something different in a shave, and was always interested in using the straight.

 

[professorchaos]

Destiny. Straights were created, refined, and used through the ages. I was destined to use them once our paths met.

 

[johnmrson]

I saw it as a natural progression. I shaved with a DE on and off since I first started shaving. I tried all the new multi blade razors and the push clean blades but kept gravitating back to a DE. After that it seemed that moving to a straight was the right thing to do.

 

[Slash McCoy]

The cool factor. This site didn't exist. In fact, the internet as we know it complete with the www didn't exist. I had no support group or instruction manual so it was quite a learning curve and it was the better part of a year before I was getting good edges and good shaves. That first razor was NOT shave-ready and while I knew enough to hone it with the spine on the stone, I innocently assumed that I could use the same collection of Arkies that I used for my knives to hone my razor to a shaving edge. After all, my favorite Buck hollowground folder shaved arm hair just fine...

 

[gash]

I liked the purity of it. Just you and the blade. No bars, combs, hand-holding.

 

[brucered]

Price made me do it.

Well, sort of...It was his last PIF that really got me thinking about straights, even though they had been on my mind for a little while. I didn't win, but shortly after purchased a straight and strop (still en route to me)

 

[Krodor]

Larry. 'nuff said.