Experiment: Imperial leather hand soap

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363
Location
West Devon
Good afternoon, Gents.

So while my Missus goes out with her Mum for the afternoon I decided to pamper myself with a long, hot bath and a nice shave. The pamper idea was followed by curiosity as I opened a new bar of Imperial leather to take to the bathroom and I wondered if it would make a decent shave soap. While the bath was running and after a good bit of prep, I put the bar in mt left hand and gave the brush a good whirl around on the soap. I must say it lathered very well indeed. So, I applied the later from the brush to my face and got stuck in.

Razor: Bluebeard's Revenge Scimitar
Blade Voskhod Teflon
Soap: White Imperial leather

OK, so the soap went on thick and the first pass was a bit hit-and-miss; some patches were almost BBS, others it looked like the razor had just skipped over the four-days'-worth of growth.

Second pass, soap was a bit drier and this time all the hair was gone. Time for a XTG third pass. Pretty good!

Not the best shave I've ever had to be honest but perfectly acceptable and I wouldn't feel embarrassed going to a job interview with it though if I was on a first date I might want to give it another pass, just to be sure ;-)

So there you are. The first time I've shaved with a hand soap. I don't know if I'll do it again but if I really hit on hard times it's probably better than Fairy Liquid!
 
The barber I go for haircut, he uses Imperial Lather hand soap for the neck. basically lathers and put the lather to the neck, then strops the razor(while stropping the lather doesn't dry???). He told me that Imperial Lather is just as good as a shaving soap. I tried it but the lather dried halfway trough.
There was a thread about this subject a year ago or so.
 
Greetings

I have played about with home made shaving soaps and the best I found was Pears soap melted in the microwave with added Glycerine and it does work, it makes a lather that does not collapse and gives reasonable slip.

After all the faffing about does it make a product that is either better or cheaper than a 50P Palmolive stick? The answer to this is no, so is it worth it? No again!

I accept you can shave with nearly anything that has a bit of slip to it ie KY Jelly, Margarine, cooking oil, shower gel, etc etc but is it better (not withstanding the awful bloody mess) than a 50p shaving stick? IMHO a resounding no!

Regards
Dick.
 
Helveticum said:
Of course not, and I'm also sure most folks here aren't limited to 50p either. It's all about excitement of experimenting, Dick :)

Greetings

To be quite fair it was amusing playing about with these, what a mess I made, it was like being a naughty ten year old again!

Regards
Dick.
 
Please be aware that although I may not reply to all, its all going in and I am prepared to have a go at anything, but on second-thoughts maybe not the KY jelly, I really can't be doing with the smell!
 
Father in law (age 70) shaves with imperial soap and a Gillette tech, he always has done. There were none of these nancy boy la de da shaving soaps when he was a lad! He's happy as larry, sees no need for a separate shaving soap.
 
It's an old thread I'm digging up here I know!

I really rate proper Imperial leather soap, the old formula stuff (not the new gloopy Thai stuff!).

Anyone on here use the old stuff to shave with? I might give it a spin! If it works for those old boys then no reason why it shouldn't work for us. I just love the smell of it, and it lasts forever and a day!
 
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