My first ever DE shave

Well, I had planned on getting up ultra early (for me, that's 6am) and taking my time to shower and shave with ample time for prep in a unhurried pace and state of mind. But, as you can read in my post on the LeisureGuy's Guide to Gourmet Shaving, I didn't get to bed until after 1am... so, when my alarm went off at 6am, I said NO. 7am? Still not ready to wake up. I decided, since my kids needed to get ready for school and my wife would kill me if I didn't help, plus I had some stuff I had to do early in the day for work, that I would find some time in the afternoon to take my time with it.

It's once again almost 1am as I write this, so this post won't be as involved as I would have liked. I'm having "Boy's Night Up" with my oldest, watching movies, so I should really not be on the computer at all. Check out the book post for more details. I may come back to this and update it with more details.

Long story short, the shave went pretty well, but I think my prep was lacking. Instead of shaving cream, I used the Edwin Jagger Aloe Vera shaving soap. This was my first experience with trying to use soap, and I can say I borked the lather. :-) It wasn't horrendous, but it also wasn't good enough and only lasted one and a half passes... so I had to try and get more lather twice more. My new Edwin Jagger brush was MUCH nicer than my AoS brush for both lathering and feel on my face. I tried using shorter strokes with the razor, which seemed to work really well, but getting the blade angle right on different parts of the face was difficult at best. Now that I am paying more attention, I think I ALWAYS had a problem with this even using cartridges. The shave I got, without really going against the grain (ATG), though I did in some small areas, and instead doing multiple across the grain (XTG) passes, was VERY good. Better than any previous shave I have had with less irritation. I noticed I missed some areas, even all together, so it will take some getting used to where this razor cuts from (i.e., not all the way out to the edges) and working on getting my technique better.

The hardware I used:

• The Merkur Vision 2000. I have it cranked down to the lowest setting (least aggressive) and it gave a really good shave. The massiveness of it takes some getting used to, as does the blade angle, but I got a good result for my first shave.
• I used one of the Merkur Super Platinum blades that came with the Vision.
  
• The Super Badger Edwin Jagger brush. They call it "Super Badger", which I'm not sure where it sits in the rankings, but it sure looks like Silvertip Badger to me, and is softer and plusher than the Dovo travel brush which was called "Silvertip Badger". From what I can tell, different geographies have different names for similar classes of brush hair, so it's difficult to simply go off names.
• The Apothocary black porcelin Edwin Jagger shaving mug. This was great in helping me build a lather, but I still did it wrong (no fault of the brush or mug... all me). The deep black color of the mug was helpful in seeing how well I was building the lather and will definitely come in handy in the future as I start to learn better technique.
• The Aloe Vera Edwin Jagger shaving soap. I have never used shaving soap before and it definitely seems different to build lather than shaving cream. Probably just a different technique than cream (which is all I've used to this point). Hopefully I can get the hang of soap quickly, but I will be taking my Art of Shaving (AoS) Shaving Cream on my trip in case I have to fall back to something I'm more familiar with.
• Finished up with styptic pen and finally AoS After Shave Balm.

I'd like to get an Alum Block and liquid styptic instead of the styptic sticks which leave a powdery residue.

My shave could have been better for several reasons: 1) My last shave wasn't very good and I had several ingrowns and bumps. 2) My prep, especially lathering, could have been better. 3) Technique needs some work too, especially razor blade angle around the different areas of the face.

I have read people talking about the Vision being too massive to shave with, especially under the nose. I can understand this complaint, but it was fairly easily overcome and my upper lip is in good shape. I couldn't go XTG because it is still far to sensitive from previous shaves, but I think that would easily solve the issue of the large razor head.

I am thinking of trying my Gillette Super Speed tomorrow to see how well that works for me. It may be easier for me for now, in which case I would possibly only take that razor on my trip. I may wind up taking both.

Anyway, that's all for now. I need to get back to my son.

********Update 3/29/08********

Well, I'm about to go and have my shave for today, but I thought of some things about my last shave to add.

One thing that I found about my lather (which is what is troubling me most I think), aside from not being thick or voluminous enough, the lather seemed to go deep into the brush. I'm not sure if this is what is supposed to happen, but it's not what I remember with my AoS brush. Maybe it's because I was using soap instead of shaving cream... it was my first time with soap, so I have no idea if I was doing things correctly. I found that in between passes, I had to pinch the base of the bristles and squeeze the lather up to the tip of the brush, but then it never seemed to be enough lather... so I had to build more lather in between passes. With my AoS brush and AoS shaving cream I did not need to do this for three passes with lather still left in the brush at the end... AND, I built the lather on my beard (without a bowl). So, certainly some experimenting is in order. Maybe today I will have time to experiment a little.

Correction: After watching the following video, I now think that my problem was NOT my lathering technique, or my brush, or my bowl, but rather that the soap was brand new, and I fear that the brush did not get enough soap on it. My lather 1) did NOT come out like that in thickness and such, and 2) took me forever to create. I think I may soak the soap in hot water for a little bit to soften it up and see if that makes a difference at all. I remember thinking it seemed very hard and wasn't sure if enough soap was getting on to the brush. (I did just find in the book that some people noted soaking the soap in hot water while showering helped, so hopefully this will solve my problem... at least initially to get the soap to soften. May not need to do this every time)