My wife and I are getting together today with my sister and her husband and my parents for lunch and a movie (White Christmas). While I don’t really need to, I decided yesterday that I wanted to shave, so I started thinking about what I’d use for the bonus shave.
Would I stick with the Gillette 7 O’Clock black blade I’ve been using this week in the Henson medium? Or pick something else? I haven’t used the King C Gillette razor for a while…maybe I need to shuffle that in? The lathering choice seemed obvious: something Proraso.
It’s amazing sometimes what changes first thing in the morning. After waking up and thinking a bit about the shave, I realized that since I got my blade organizer, all of my blades except the tuck I’m using that week, are in the basement in my den. So maybe I’ll stick with the Henson medium and the 7 O’Clock black. But then I noticed I had a Shark Super Stainless blade in the razor box, and it has only been used once.
I got out all of the Proraso blue products, the bowl and the brush and then decided on another change: let’s try them with the Barbasol 1919 lather and balm. After all, a more aggressive setup may need that extra protection.
Lots of changes in a short time. Yeah, sometimes it’s hard to be me.
The Rating
Sunday’s Shave, #211. The KCG-1919-Shark shave.
The setup:
- Razor: King C Gillette
- Blade: Lord Shark Super Stainless
- Pre-Shave: Razor Emporium Unscented pre-shave
- Soap/Cream/Gel: Barbasol 1919 shaving cream
- Alum Block: Stirling Soap Co. Alum
- After Shave: Barbasol 1919 after shave balm
Considering I was all ready to go Proraso blue (and even took the picture of the setup) almost right up until I jumped in the shower, this one turned out pretty well.
This was my first pairing with the KCG and the Shark blade, and it wouldn’t have happened yet if I hadn’t had that loose blade in the razor box. But it seemed like a reasonable pairing–a little more aggressive than I usually like to go, perhaps, but it would work.
The Barbasol 1919 cream is thick and doesn’t really lather much. I worked it in, and it provided its usual awesome slickness. But I felt a little out of practice with the KCG–it took me a few strokes to get the angle right.
In the end, there was a little more stubble left behind than I’d like, but it isn’t that bad, really. But the shave was very comfortable with almost no sting with the alum. So it wasn’t almost perfect, but got very close.
I’ll have to come back to the KCG-Shark combo later because I think that could be very nice.
Comfort: 24 of 25
Quality/Closeness: 21 of 25
Overall: 22 of 25
