Let’s face it, Gillette is the thousand-pound gorilla in shaving. They have a strong foothold in just about every aspect of shaving, and have a pretty broad product line (though you’d almost never know about their safety razor products if you went to their website).
So way back in January (which honestly feels like eons ago in this shaving journey I’ve been on), I ordered a couple more razor blade sampler packs from Razor Emporium. One of them was a Gillette sampler which at the time contained the Nacet, Platinum, Silver Blue, and the 7 O’Clock Yellow, Green and Black blades. I dove in and used them with my King C Gillette, finding the Nacet and Silver Blue to be instant favorites, but also loving the Yellow for its comfortable, though not terribly close shave.
As I recently came into a bunch of Gillette 7 O’Clock Super Stainless (green) blades and tried those in my 3 favorite razors (both Hensons and the Rockwell), and have a bunch of yellows and one tuck of blacks, I decided to revisit the rest of the Gillette 7 O’Clock line, starting, of course, with the one that got the least raves and I have the fewest of–the blacks.
According to some brief internet research on the history of the 7 O’Clock brand, it was not originally a Gillette brand, but a separate American entity that patented the 7 O’Clock name (a.m.? p.m.? I’m assuming 7 a.m., but who knows) around 1914 and made safety razors and blades. At some point before the late ’40s, Gillette bought the brand and its products, and as with a lot of Gillette products, manufacturing moved to other parts of the world by the ’60s and ’70s. Manufacture of the 7 O’Clock razor moved to India and the current cheap plastic version of the razors are pretty much just sold in that region. The blades, though, are now made in Russia and India, with the green blades made in Russia and the yellow and black made in India.
So, the test for the next three weeks is to put the black through its paces in the Hensons and the Rockwell to see how it stacks up against the greens. Back in February, I liked the comfort of the yellow and the closeness of the greens, and the blacks were just kind of in the middle and unremarkable, but my shaves have advanced and improved considerably since then both in terms of technique and products, so we’ll see where they stand these days. The Greens did pretty well a few weeks ago, especially with the Henson mild, so this should be a fun comparison.
I’m also excited to get back to the Arko shave stick, and to try out the new Hoffman’s Grooming Bushido shave stick this week as well. A fun looking shave week ahead!
The Ratings
Sunday’s Shave, #202. The Proraso green Gillette black Sunday Shave.
The setup:
- Razor: Rockwell 6C plate 4
- Blade: Gillette 7 O’Clock Super Platinum (black)
- Pre-Shave: Proraso Refreshing pre-shave cream (green)
- Brush: Proraso boar shaving brush
- Soap/Cream/Gel: Proraso Refreshing shave cream (green)
- Alum Block: Stirling Soap Co. Alum
- After Shave: Proraso Refreshing aftershave balm (green)
Let’s get this out of the way from the start: this was an almost perfect shave. Some sting with the alum right away, but it faded quickly and was easily soothed by the balm. The shave itself, with my standard 3 pass shave, was very close and comfortable, with no apparent nicks or cuts.
The Proraso green pre-shave is aggressively menthol-y, shooting the vapors into my nose and eyes as soon as it’s applied, but the cooling feel is very pleasant. The shave cream lathered excellently today, and the combination of that and the pre-shave made for the usual slickness and protection I expect from my Proraso shaves. There was some lingering coolness as I put on the balm, but it faded fairly quickly afterward.
The Rockwell glides easily with a minimum of effort due to its weight, and I think it works slightly better at the WTG passes on my neck than the Hensons do simply due to the weight difference.
So out of the gate, an excellent shave to start the week, and that’s always a good thing.
Comfort: 23 of 25
Quality/Closeness: 23 of 25
Overall: 23 of 25
Tuesday’s Shave, #203. The Arko Gillette 7 O’Clock black shave.
The setup:
- Razor: Rockwell 6C plate 3
- Blade: Gillette 7 O’Clock Super Platinum black
- Pre-Shave: Proraso Sensitive pre-shave cream (white)
- Brush: Omega 10019 boar shaving brush
- Soap/Cream/Gel: Arko Shave Stick
- Alum Block: Stirling Soap Co. Alum
- After Shave: Dollar Shave Club Post Shave Cream
I’ll be honest: as soon as I started this shave, I knew it would be very mild. There was very little blade feel and I had my doubts it would be very close, as even on my cheeks, where usually one WTG and one ATG pass are enough to get a smooth result, and I was right at the start. But after a few extra strokes, I had some excellent closeness without any added irritation.
So yes, this shave is also almost perfect. It was incredibly comfortable, with very mild brief sting from the alum, but also the closeness I want, with almost no stubble left behind. The Dollar Shave Club Post Shave Cream moisturizes very well, and just makes for a nice feel to my skin for most of the day after applying. But the mildness has me thinking about Thursday’s shave, where I’m planning on using plate 2 on the Rockwell, and I may decide to step that up to plate 5. We’ll see.
The Arko shave stick worked well again, as I’m finding that rubbing it around the inside of the bowl seems to be the way to go. I’ve decided that face lathering won’t really work for me, as I always use some pretty slick pre-shaves, and combined with the beard, I don’t think it would work well. But having a thin layer rubbed in the bottom and lower sides of the bowl made a nice lather, though I did make it just slightly thinner than I’d normally like.
After two uses with the 7 O’Clock black blade, I’m thinking it falls between the green and yellow blades in terms of aggessiveness, which is interesting to me, since the Razor Emporium aggressiveness rating rates all three at 3.5 out of 5. I’m looking forward to continuing trying it out in both the Henson mild and medium to see how it works.
One more shave with the Rockwell on Thursday with a new soap!
Comfort: 24 out of 25
Quality/Closeness: 23 out of 25
Overall: 23 out of 25
Thursday’s Shave, #204. The stick shave.
The setup:
- Razor: Rockwell 6C plate 2
- Blade: Gillette 7 O’Clock Super Platinum (black)
- Pre-Shave: Razor Emporium Unscented pre-shave
- Brush: Omega 10019 boar brush
- Soap/Cream/Gel: Hoffman’s Grooming Bushido shave stick
- Alum Block: Stirling Soap Co. Alum
- After Shave: Nivea Sensitive Soothing post shave balm
Introducing a new-to-me soap, in the form of Hoffman’s Grooming Bushido shave soap stick. (See, and since I also used a stick-based pre-shave, it’s the stick shave? Get it?)
I’ll review this soap in an upcoming post, along with the others I got from Hoffman’s. But this is a soap I’ve seen fairly often online, and it’s always been pretty well reviewed. For a stick soap, it’s softer than I expected, but still worked well to rub into my shave bowl and lather there. It didn’t need much water and produced an excellent thick, slick and protective lather. Being the first try with it, I’m going to have to get used to the fragrance, but I’ll talk more about that in another post.
So how was the shave overall? Almost perfect. I opted to stick with the original plan and go with plate 2 on the Rockwell, and this was indeed a very mild shave that needed a bunch of extra strokes, but there wasn’t a lot of extra irritation. There was slightly more irritation than Tuesday’s shave, but it didn’t last long and the balm has helped my skin recover.
But it appears that on the Rockwell, plate 3 is the shave sweet spot for the 7 O’Clock black blade.
Next week, I move on to pair the blade with the Henson mild. We’ll see how that goes!
Comfort: 23 out of 25
Quality/Closeness: 23 out of 25
Overall: 23 out of 25
