So, I have been shaving with straights for two years and never been able to get my neck better than passable. Even with a 3 pass (with, across, against) a close-ish look, showed some stubble under my jaw. I also have had some intermittent ingrown hairs on the right side of my face by my jawline.
I am just discovering that the main problem was that I didn't have a good "face map". I was treating my passes as first north-south, the east-west/west-east and finally south north, regardless of whether this was actually with, across and against the grain.
Recently, I have been shaving with DEs from time to time, and if you don't know how your hair grows, those things will rip you up nicely. After some bad shaves, I began watching the classic Mantic videos on DE shaving, and following his advice, I grew out my beard for a few days and finally figured out how my hair grows. I now know that my neck hair grows left to right on my left, vice versa on my right and north south on my Adam's apple. Also, my hair on my face along my right jawline grows right to left, while the rest is north south. Thus, my passes weren't really doing what they should. I was missing hairs on my neck almost altogether, because I had to have an almost non-existent angle to avoid ripping out my hairs on a north-south fist pass, and was doing an against the grain shave stroke on my first pass on the right side of my face, thus the ingrown hairs.
I have, in the past few weeks, been adjusting my passes to reflect the way my hair actually grows. My passes are now all mixed up in terms of direction, but are now properly with, across, and against the grain. It was weird at first, but I am now used to it, and my shaves are a million times better. My neck gets a damn fine shave and my face is perfectly smooth, with no ingrown hairs.
I know this is nothing new, but I thought I'd share how much of a difference this has made to me, in hopes that some beginners might take the time to learn their beards.
Happy shaving.
Steve
I am just discovering that the main problem was that I didn't have a good "face map". I was treating my passes as first north-south, the east-west/west-east and finally south north, regardless of whether this was actually with, across and against the grain.
Recently, I have been shaving with DEs from time to time, and if you don't know how your hair grows, those things will rip you up nicely. After some bad shaves, I began watching the classic Mantic videos on DE shaving, and following his advice, I grew out my beard for a few days and finally figured out how my hair grows. I now know that my neck hair grows left to right on my left, vice versa on my right and north south on my Adam's apple. Also, my hair on my face along my right jawline grows right to left, while the rest is north south. Thus, my passes weren't really doing what they should. I was missing hairs on my neck almost altogether, because I had to have an almost non-existent angle to avoid ripping out my hairs on a north-south fist pass, and was doing an against the grain shave stroke on my first pass on the right side of my face, thus the ingrown hairs.
I have, in the past few weeks, been adjusting my passes to reflect the way my hair actually grows. My passes are now all mixed up in terms of direction, but are now properly with, across, and against the grain. It was weird at first, but I am now used to it, and my shaves are a million times better. My neck gets a damn fine shave and my face is perfectly smooth, with no ingrown hairs.
I know this is nothing new, but I thought I'd share how much of a difference this has made to me, in hopes that some beginners might take the time to learn their beards.
Happy shaving.
Steve
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