'All Agrog' Bay Rum, shaving & pre-shave oil, by Urban Hermit
The Knack (1971) razor with Super Silver blade, both by Gillette
Bay Rum glycerin shave soap, by Colonel Conk (from a Wallace and Grommit soap dish - nerd chique or what?)
'Syntetico' brush, by men-u
'All Agrog' Bay Rum, shaving & pre-shave oil, by Urban Hermit
alum block
'Bay Rum Baba Balm' aftershave lotion, by Urban Hermit
& plenty of cold, clear water (*echo* ...wa-ter)
A series 3 passes, & 3 thorough cold water rinses, then an oil pass/polishing pass, another thorough, thoroughly-cold, cold water rinse, an abundantly ample application of alum (& alliteration) - let face dry while starting clean up, then yet another cold water rinse and cap it all off with my balm/lotion.
Excellent results: very smooth, very fresh, very nice ... a very DFS, sans any DBaby's Bum!
Note: A very brief bit of non-arrogant smugness follows; directly after which, a short anecdote from the Urban Hermitage featuring SWMBA, shall be presented. Thank you, carry on.
Non-arrogant smugness commences:
Believe me when I write that I'm not normally my own horn-tooter, but, I made the oil & balm last night, (mostly) with assorted base/carrier oils, essential oils, witch hazel, aloe vera & darkrum, and so on. I really wish I had been able to channel my OCD into recording the recipes, because I thought they did great - especially as I've only made a one other of similar things. The oil could probably be used without any soap/cream for a full 4+ pass shave without allowing a burn or major nick, and the balm has enough alcohol that those who don't use alum, would get their sting in, followed immediately by the soothing of the sting and the entire shave-area too. I made a 60ml bottle of the oil & 300ml of the balm, so at least I have a fair supply of it before I have to try and improvise the recipe again - at least I made a list of all that went into it, if not how much of everything that went into them.
Sadly, the oil bottle is not the best seal, though the pump is fastened tight. A bit of the oil (not much just a drop or two) will end up on the outer surface of the bottle after each session of shaking it - and it needs shaking as I'm not 100% sure what I could have added to stop the various oils from separarting ... some kind of emulsifier I suppose?
Anecdote commences:
This morning, SWMBA had a sniff of them when she went to move the bottles out of the way, as I seem to have left them not far enough off to one side of things ... so, I asked her what she thought of them.
She thought briefly about it before saying - with some actual enthusiam, that "they smell 'OK'."
"Just 'OK'?" I asked (because I wanted more feedback in case they could be tweaked to improvement).
She replied: "They're pretty nice, but kind of ... blokey. I wouldn't use them.".
I hope I didn't look at her like too much of an alien visitor to her planet, and followed up asking for yet more clairifcation: "But, are they any good for a male human to wear?"
"Oh, yeah. They'd be fine for that".
I decided that that was near enough to a compliment on the stuff, and that this experiment is near enough to be called something of a great success.
EDIT: Fumbly-finger induced spelling etc, corrected - I hope.