Hi All,
Checking in to say hello and let you know how I went with my first two shaves in what I hope will be a long and satisfying wet shaving life.
Firstly, here is what I'm using:
Merkur 38C (was going to get the 34C but I have biggish hands and smallish face and read somewhere that a longer handle will be easier to control. True?)
Sampler Pack of blades (Used Merkur blade for first shave, Derby for second.)
Badger hair brush
Proraso White Pre-Shave Cream (using post shave also, along with WH)
Prorasi White Shaving Soap
So for the first shave (with Merkur blade) I really took my time and ended up doing too many passes as I tried pick up all the areas I missed or felt weren't close enough.
Note that I actually did 3 full passes - WTG, XTG, ATG - the rest were pickups where I only lathered the areas I was fixing. The bulk of these were on my neck as it is difficult to judge the direction of the grain. It goes in several it seems. That said, I got away with one nic on my neck but that close.
After doing a lot of reading on blades in particular, I decided to switch blades to the Derby Extra for my second shave. I soaked my brush in warm water while I showered, then came out and applied the pre-shave cream. Here is my first question:
Do I rinse after applying the pre-shave and then apply lather? I ask this because I didn't. The lather went straight over the top.
On to the first pass. I noticed a definite difference between the blades and I think this lead to the first of my many errors. I don't think I changed the amount of pressure I applied. I think that because I was so focused on getting a closer shave than the first one I resorted to some old cartridge shaving habits and forgot what I held in my hands.
When I got to my neck the butchering commenced. I felt I did so many things wrong here I honestly don't know which things contributed to the bleeding.
After reading several posts here I think it was a combination of some or all of the following:
-Not enough lather
-Going ATG on my first pass (shaving N to S, the bottom of my neck either side of my Adam's apple is ATG while the top is WTG.
-Too much pressure
-Too many passes, especially over areas that were already bleeding.
Next question: What do I do with the areas that bled on my next shave? Do I assumed that it has healed enough and treat as normal? Is it worth applying WH on my non-shaving days (I shave every other day)?
Well after my neck debauchery I pretty much gave up on the shave, rinsed, applied WH and pre-shave cream again, then a Nivea moisturiser for sensitive skin.
Where to go from here? These are my final questions:
Should I switch back to the more forgiving Merkur blade for a few more shaves until my technique improves or stick to the Derby blade and just focus on improving my technique?
Should I apply my pre-shave cream before every pass or just once at the beginning?
What is the quickest way to eliminate bad cartridge razor habits?
I plan on practising tonight without a blade to try and improve how I hold the razor as well as working on stiffening my wrist.
Sorry for the War and Peace post guys. Any feedback at all will be very much appreciated.
Mark
This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service - if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at http://ift.tt/jcXqJW.
Wet Shaving Rookie: First Shave OK. Second shave.butchered neck
شارك عبر الماسنجر
