OK, we've all seen so much about this soap and how it's basically a "love / hate" relationship. Because I've found grating and pressing into a bowl somehow changes the "lathering" characteristics, specifically, how the brush picks up the soap, I thought I'd give it a try.
Note, I haven't used Williams with a decent brush before so I'm going in blind, except for the opinions of others, and don't have anything to compare it to.
This morning I picked up 3 pucks at a grocery store for the meager cost of $1.39 each. Below you'll see the "tools" I used for this:
Here's 1 puck grated and partially in the bowl, and below that, rest in the bowl and pressed with my Espresso tamper (covered with 1/2 a sandwich baggie):
You can see that the 1 puck pressed left plenty of room in the container for the other 2 pucks.
Off to the bathroom where I wet the top of the soap cake and soaked the EJ brush (Best Badger, I selected that one only because it was the next in the rotation):
I swirled the brush for maybe 20 seconds:
And then added a little water to whip up what I hoped would be a good lather:
Lathered up on my hand a little, and you can probably tell it's a little watery:
It is, however, very slick feeling on my hand and between my fingers. The smell is wonderful too. Not overpowering, just a nice "old time" scent. I think tomorrow morning I'll try this "face lathering" and see how it works out. From this one test, it seems to be quite reactive to a little water added to the lather in the bowl, and I do find it easier to control how "wet" the lather is when face lathering with other soaps.
All in all, I consider this enough of a success that I'm going to grate the other 2 pucks and add it in.
For those of you familiar with William's, it has the "Mug" pressed into the top of the puck. When I grated it I left a little round part showing that impression, and placed that in the bottom, logo down and pressed the soap on top of that. It doesn't really show up well in this picture because of the glass and the name formed across the glass, but to hold it up to the eye, the mug logo stands out clear. Nice little touch that I don't have to label this.
I'll report back tomorrow after I face lather with this.
Note, I haven't used Williams with a decent brush before so I'm going in blind, except for the opinions of others, and don't have anything to compare it to.
This morning I picked up 3 pucks at a grocery store for the meager cost of $1.39 each. Below you'll see the "tools" I used for this:
Here's 1 puck grated and partially in the bowl, and below that, rest in the bowl and pressed with my Espresso tamper (covered with 1/2 a sandwich baggie):
You can see that the 1 puck pressed left plenty of room in the container for the other 2 pucks.
Off to the bathroom where I wet the top of the soap cake and soaked the EJ brush (Best Badger, I selected that one only because it was the next in the rotation):
I swirled the brush for maybe 20 seconds:
And then added a little water to whip up what I hoped would be a good lather:
Lathered up on my hand a little, and you can probably tell it's a little watery:
It is, however, very slick feeling on my hand and between my fingers. The smell is wonderful too. Not overpowering, just a nice "old time" scent. I think tomorrow morning I'll try this "face lathering" and see how it works out. From this one test, it seems to be quite reactive to a little water added to the lather in the bowl, and I do find it easier to control how "wet" the lather is when face lathering with other soaps.
All in all, I consider this enough of a success that I'm going to grate the other 2 pucks and add it in.
For those of you familiar with William's, it has the "Mug" pressed into the top of the puck. When I grated it I left a little round part showing that impression, and placed that in the bottom, logo down and pressed the soap on top of that. It doesn't really show up well in this picture because of the glass and the name formed across the glass, but to hold it up to the eye, the mug logo stands out clear. Nice little touch that I don't have to label this.
I'll report back tomorrow after I face lather with this.
