Practical Shaving with a Double-edge Safety Razor
The product review site TheSweethome.com has a page on manual shaving written by the guy who broke the story in 1989 on Gillette’s release of the original Sensor. That was the razor that started the hyperbolic “tech” cycle in shaving. I give the man some credit.
Still, I disagree with what he has this to say about double-edge safety razors (the kind you see Cary Grant using in black and white movies):
…old-school shaving is a time-consuming process, filling up about 15 minutes on the short end from start to finish. That’s a lot longer than most people are willing to spend on just a single grooming task in the morning, but many proponents of this method of shaving come to value the ritual aspect of this approach as much as the quality of the shave.
This was once my experience with double-edge safety razors, but it is no longer. My current process takes less than one incremental minute. Here it is:
- Take a shower.
- Before drying off or stepping out of the shower, squeeze out a dab of Kiss My Face shaving cream onto your still-wet hand and rub it vigorously onto your still-wet beard.
- Turn the shower back on and shave with the grain using a double-edged safety razor and a fogless mirror. Occasionally rinse your razor in the hot water stream.
- Rinse everything off.
I think the reasons Dan Koeppel says using a safety razor takes 15 minutes is that most people who use double-edge safety razors in 2015 are likely to
- Take a long, hot shower to “open their pores”.
- Fill their sink with hot water.
- Wet a badger hair brush
- Use the badger hair brush with the water to warm and wet their beard.
- Eventually get around to using some fancy shaving cream with the badger hair brush to artistically apply it to their faces (like Cary Grant).
- Shave.
- Rinse.
- Clean up.
Image by Quality & Style 
This is not an exaggeration. Classic Shaving, which is where I bought my double-edge safety razor, has a page titled “Brush and Bristle Basics Without the Sales Pitch” that drones on and on about the importance of a badger hair brush and all the distinctions between the types of badger from which your brush can be made. This is silly. You have a hand. A brush is not an improvement on it.
Additionally, if you shower as often as you shave, you do not need a separate 14-minute ritual at the sink that wastes hot water just to get your face wet and lathered. If you shave in the shower, rinse and clean-up are the two seconds it takes to stick your face under shower head these days.
I have tried the fancy shaving creams. They are silly. Use Kiss My Face. One squirt bottle lasts a couple of years.
It’s too bad that double-edge safety razors seem to have become a finer thing in life. They are actually a very practical, inexpensive thing in life. They work well if used properly. I confess it took me time to learn to use well, but it now takes a subjective two minutes of my day.
Other must-have information:
- Don’t apply much pressure when using the safety razor. You probably have to apply *some* pressure. But don’t just mash it against your face and drag like you would a cartridge razor. You will just tear up your face that way.
- Buy decent blades. Don’t buy Gillette “Blue”-branded blades. They are awful even on the first shave. I am currently using a set of Persona blades I bought off eBay. One blade lasts me nearly a week. They are made in the USA and work great. Even premium blades are much, much cheaper than the cheapest cartridges.
- If you are like me and have a face that may develop bumps resulting from ingrown hairs, only shave with the grain. Yes, shaving against the grain will give you a closer shave, but become comfortable with the process before experimenting with shaving against the grain. Instead, if you aren’t happy with the closeness of your shave, lather up and shave again while still in the shower. Pay attention to the angle at which you are holding the razor relative to your face. The advantage of plastic cartridge razors is that you can just mash them against your face like some sort of animal and know that you have the correct cutting angle. Using a double-edge safety razor is a skill, albeit a simple one. You could even try it out on some sacrificial arm hair first to get an idea of how it ought to be used. Unlike cartridges, these razors are sensitive to the angle at which they are used. Take it slow and pay attention.
Why bother with a double-edge safety razor at all?
Most people who use these things seem to feel it helps them get in touch with their inner man. Personally, I have really thick hair that is hard to cut, but the Persona blades handle it well. It’s also nice that it is cheap and convenient now that I’ve eliminated all the more metrosexual steps of the process. The way I use it, it’s actually less fussy than any other option including electrics.
This is pretty much exactly what I do with two changes: I use Edge gel, and I use disposable double bladed razors – I don’t care which brand. Disposables eliminate problems I have with losing things. Kiss My Face might well work, I haven’t tried it. I am set in my ways.
I will shave against the grain. I’ve done this for a long time, mostly I don’t cut or abrade myself any more. This wasn’t always the case.Report
The biggest incremental improvement in the OP is choosing the shower over the sink, which it sounds like you are doing. The actual manual razor part doesn’t really save that much time.
Personally, I’ve never found double-bladed razors that cut my hairs well. Even the Mach 3 requires a couple passes sometimes. The Fusion razors do cut everything in a single pass, but they are quite expensive even on sale from Costco.
Kiss My Face
I haven’t tried a whole bunch of different ones and done a conscious comparison. There are shaving sites out there that insist that you should use something fancy and expensive, and having tried that I judged it silly. It doesn’t sound like that’s a problem for you.
I imagine this will work for a lot of people. I’ve had enough bad experiences that I’ve just given up on it. Ingrown hairs do seem to be something that affect non-whites more for whatever reason.Report
“Non-whites more for whatever reason”.
It’s not so much a race thing as a “how curly/stiff your hair is” thing (which is obviously correlated somewhat). IIRC, the curlier it is, the more likely you’ll get ingrown hairs, especially if you go against the grain.Report
This makes much more sense than my hypothesis about oil.Report
My hair is straight, not curly. Each individual follicle, however, is much thicker than white people’s hair. I don’t know if that’s a factor as well.
At any rate, I agree that it probably does have something more to do with what kind of hair you have than what race you decide to identify as.Report
You need to hang out with more Italians, Greeks, and Jews of European origin. Probably some Slavs too.Report
That’s just the black blood coming through, ya know…?Report
I’ve heard ads on podcasts for Bevel shave products, which is said to cater to coarse, curly hair. I’ve never used them, in part because my hair is pretty fine and straight (white!) and in part because I don’t really shave any more. But might be worth checking out.Report
Yes on the shower. I used to use a fogless mirror, but now I don’t even bother. I know my own face really, really well, and I can feel spots that have been missed with my fingers.
That’s interesting on the rate of ingrown hairs. I’ve had a few in my time, but not many lately. I expect this might have something to do with the amount of oil one secretes? That’s just a wild guess, I have no data.Report
Shaving in the shower is a fairly irresponsible act for Californians (and many westerners) at this point in time. I realize it opens up the pores and provides both extra lubrication and spot-rising. But it’s simply not the best use of our remaining water.Report
That’s why you shower in pairs. As a bonus, your partner can handle the back hair situation.Report
And it lets you alternate a badger brush with a skinny pete brush.Report
*vigorous but respectful golf clap*Report
Cali needs to go to a closed loop water system for grey and black water. Solve all the problems.Report
Except for that Pesky El Nino issue…Report
The second process is the one I use and it still takes me no more than 6 minutes and that includes two passes, one with and one against the grain. It ends up being almost as fast and easy as using a cartridge. The major difference is that I have to concentrate more because my chosen razor, Gillette Red Tip Superspeed, is pretty aggressive.
I think part of it is because I also multitask. There’s no reason I can’t put on deodorant and brush my hair at the same time that I fill my sink with hot water to wet my brush. Maybe I should count that time as “shaving” time, but that’s time I would have to spend in the morning anyway.Report
6 minutes is much more reasonable. I’m not sure how Koeppel gets to 15. It is a piece primarily about cartridge razors, so perhaps he just wanted to pick a big round number?Report
I think a lot of it is going for unnecessary closeness and precision. I could use my free hand to stretch the skin on every stroke I take and I’ll probably end up with a closer shave. I doubt that it is close enough to make it worth taking three times as long though.Report
I can accept the use of the safety razor, as a principal benefit I have found with a straight razor is the single, sharp, strong blade as opposed to the multiple thin blades of the commercial razor-head cartridge. I can see the use of the safety razor as a convenience compared to the straight razor and its many associated rituals.
But the oil really helps. I really like the oil. I really like how it lubricates the skin and helps me move the razor, even when I press it into the whisker. If that makes me a “metrosexual” so be it. (I suppose admitting that the oil smells good does make me a metrosexual, but yeah, it does smell good.)
And the badger-hair brush is better than my hand. It applies the lather in a more uniform, faster, and longer-lasting way. I spend all of fifteen seconds running the brush under some hot water and then creating a lather from the soap. This isn’t that time-consuming.
I timed my straight-razor shave this morning after reading the post. Eight minutes and fifteen seconds. I imagine the safety razor does go faster – but really, how much?Report
If you really want to look your best, you want a brush made from honey badger. You know why.
Stink-badger brushes are best avoided.Report
My shaving cream smells good too! I’ve tried oil before, and it didn’t work that well for me. I don’t know if I wasn’t applying enough or something else.
To describe a bit of my facial hair right now, one streak of hair above one eye is raising into an arch of doubtfulness.Report
@burt-likko
I am a bit too scared to use a straight razor. Every now and then I like getting a professional shave as a treat but using one myself. Freaky man.Report
I’ve used a double edge safety razor for years. I have a typical old guy beard.
In my opinion, razor blades don’t go south because of use. They go south because nobody cleans them and they corrode due to the nasty (water, shave cream/soap, old whiskers) environment that they are usually subjected to.
After shaving, I spin the top of the razor off and take the blade out and wipe it off on my forearm or a washcloth (both sides). When I reassemble it, I leave everything loose so it will dry out. Takes maybe 15 seconds, and the blade (“platinum” of some persuasion) usually will last for weeks.
The only caution is to tighten the razor back up before you shave the next day. Failing to do so will give your face the old bacon-slicer treatment. Not good.Report
That is my understanding as well. I do sort of brush it against a towel at the end. And I actually store it outside of the bathroom now since my wife once grabbed hold of it while fishing for something else and got a bad cut. They are cheap enough that that is all I’m willing to do.
Incidentally, there are all sorts of old husband’s tales on the Internet about ways to extend the life of expensive cartridges. Honing them on jeans and such.Report
I use one of these:
http://www.getbladebuddy.com/faq/
I can’t tell you for sure whether it’s all BS though. I shave infrequently enough (once a week, sometimes less) that blades last me a while anyway, so it’s hard to tell if this is making a huge difference or not. A daily shaver would be a better test subject.Report
Interesting idea. I notice that they do admit this:
It would seem this doesn’t help with corrosion, but maybe it’s still good enough to extend the life of your cartridges. Now that I think of it, the jeans idea probably has the same principle in mind of bending the edge of the blades back to approximately straight.Report
Yeah, at least conceptually it could theoretically work. I basically start using this the second or third time I use a blade.
But again, I don’t go through that many blades a year anyway, since I generally shave so infrequently (incidentally, I am of the mind that shaving infrequently is actually part of getting a good shave – the whiskers are longer and easier to cut, and your skin has time to recover from being abraded).Report
When I shave in the shower, I get beard splinters. Hairs will stick to me and embed themselves in my skin.Report
I wonder why women are not encouraged to use badger brushes, too. Like, I’ve never heard it even mentioned.Report
Women don’t need no stinkin’ badger brushes.Report
I think the same caution I extend to head shaving probably should apply to all areas a woman might want to shave.
I do think it’s interesting that there hasn’t been a women’s movement in shaving cream brushes. They already have makeup brushes, which aren’t too far off. Some of them are large enough, in fact, that I think they could be used directly. It’s not like your shaving cream or oil cares kind of fiber is used.Report
You guys make me feel like such a Philistine for using an electric razor.Report
I went through various iterations of shaving technique until I finally hit on the ultimate solution: I don’t shave. I go to a real barber (complete with striped pole and old magazines) (as contrasted with a “stylist”). I have him take the beard down short. Ideally it is just longer than the ‘itchy’ phase. I combine this with my regular haircuts. The beard getting a bit shaggy is usually an issue before my (extremely limited) hair, so I probably end up getting a haircut about a week earlier than I otherwise would. I could extend the process through home grooming, but avoiding the need for home hair grooming is pretty much my main goal in life. At this point I have it down to having to trim the mustache once in the cycle, when it starts growing over the lip in an annoying manner.Report
What’s your experience with the Gillette Fusion (if any)?
Back when I shaved my face, I found that I could use, for example, the “Good News” disposable razor and get a good enough shave to get me to tomorrow. Sure, I had 5 o’clock shadow around noonish, but I was blonde enough that that didn’t matter really.
When I used those exact same razors to shave my head, I probably needed 6 or 7 different pieces of toilet paper to deal with the nicks and cuts and dings and whatnot. My head felt downright peeled.
I suspect that this method of shaving wouldn’t work for head shaving. There are too many things that could go wrong.Report
On my face, the Fusion provides a nice shave, but they are hella expensive, and the blades being closer together means that it gets clogged up with whiskers bigtime and is hard to rinse. Not even close to worth the extra expense over Mach 3’s, or knockoffs thereof.
Maybe you need one of these:
http://www.amazon.com/HeadBlade-ATX-Terrain-Head-Razor/dp/B00A4WN0TWReport
@jaybird ,
I have used the Fusion, but as Glyph mentioned, I think you have to be some sort of Rockefeller to use it consistently. If all options cost the same, it would be my top pick, I think.
I wouldn’t try using a double-edged safety razor on my head. Safety would be my number one concern for head shaving to the point that I would probably try Wahl “balding clippers” before any sort of razor. Among razors, I have heard some good things about the head blade that Glyph links to, but I haven’t tried it myself. For my hair, I just use regular Wahl clippers.Report
Even if all options cost the same, I don’t know if I’d use the Fusion, like I said I feel like I waste a lot of time trying to rinse the cut whiskers out of it between passes. I guess if I were so rich that I could just throw it away when it clogged that could work.
Though, as I said, I am an infrequent shaver, so my whiskers are probably longer than the average bear’s when I shave. Maybe for a daily shaver, the clogging would be a non-issue.Report
I’ve never experienced clogging with the Fusion. A good stream of water gets everything out, in my experience.
The Mach 3? I had to keep some sewing needles by the sink in order to clean that thing (between swipes, even!).Report
This is my experience as well. Fusion doesn’t clog. The Mach 3 does. For this reason, I actually do think the Fusion is a better value than the Mach 3 for me.Report
Do you trim before you shave, if you go a while without shaving?Report
Depends how scruffy I am and how much of a hurry I am in.
Often, no, since the answer to question #2 is almost always, “a huge one”.
But obviously it’s preferred.
But, even doing that, the whiskers are still longer than they’d be from just a day or two’s worth of growth since the last shave.Report
I am similar in my shaving regularity. I might remember to shave a few times a month. Most of the time I just realize that I have a beard and trim it quickly before I leave the house in the morning.
But when I do shave, it’s always in the shower with cheap disposable razors, which work just fine.Report
Hrm. I get a good month of shaves out of a Fusion. As such, the industrial sized package of blades I get from the Costco last me more than a year.
(Also: I’m worth it.)Report
Since I currently wear a beard, my shave takes me less than a minute – just the small bits of my neck and cheeks where I don’t want my whiskers to extend to. When I go clean-shaven, my shave is still maybe three minutes, tops. I don’t use any products on my face – if I’m coming out of the shower, I just shave, otherwise I hold a hot facecloth over my face for a minute first.
I use Astra stainless blades, mostly on the strength of their being really cheap – under 20c a blade for the 100-pack – and they last a week when I’m shaving my whole face, or almost a month if I’m just doing the edges.Report
1. Shaving sucks.
2. I use a safety-razor, and I’ve tried almost everything else – but not a straight razor – but it all sucks.
3. Shaving sucks for women too.
4. What is wrong with us as a people that we’re horrified by hair? Ugh.
5. Again, shaving sucks. I would never do it if my lady friend didn’t like it so much.Report
Each of those is true for me as well.Report