Vitos gave me a pretty darned good shave. It was fairly easy to get a good lather out of it, nice and thick with good glide. Not too much in the way of volume, but that’s not all that big of a deal. Nothing out of the ordinary in the way of extra moisturizing properties, but still a nice solid shave.
The scent is a classic marzipan / sweet almond, with just a little hint of coconut. It’s quite pleasant; when the girlfriend gave the jar a sniff her eyes just lit up, and I had to warn her not to take a bite out of it.
Strength-wise is where it fails however. In the jar, it’s nice and strong. On the brush after loading up, it’s barely there. Once lathered up on the face, it fades to non-existence pretty swiftly.
- 9/10 Scent Pleasantness
- 5/10 Scent Strength
- 7/10 Lather Quality (reflects new scoring as outlined here)
Overall, I give it a 6/10. I wouldn’t recommend it really. Cella is better. Buy that instead.
- Cost: $6.49 for 125g or $29.99 for a full kg.
Gear used:
- Brush: The Colonel
- Razor: Vintage Bakelite Slant
- Blade: Bolzano Superinox
- Scuttle: Robert’s Feats of Clay #4
Ingredients: Stearic acid, hydrogenated tallow, water, potassium hydroxide, glycerin, sodium hydroxide, sodium hexametaphosphate, talc, benzaldehide.
Palpz's Shaving Soap Reviews 
In terms of bang for the buck, though,it’s hard to beat Vitos (for soap) and J.M. Fraser (for shaving cream), though I find Fraser also good in an absolute sense.
True, but if you’re all that concerned about bang for the buck, it’s hard to argue with a $35 kg brick of Cella. I’d definitely say that the difference is enough to justify an extra $5, especially considering it’s something that’ll last almost forever.
And I’ll add Fraser onto the to-do list, although I really need to put a moratorium on getting more soap until I made a much better decent dent on the stuff I already have.
I agree with you that Cella is better than Vitos. I hadn’t realize that the large-brick prices of the two were so close. Thanks. I do find that Cella can “spoil”, so one would want to be a very heavy user to invest in a 1-kg block.
The Vitos coconut is what allowed me to try a classic Italian soap for the first time. Almond is one of those scents I just can’t abide, and the coconut cuts it just enough to make it usable. Terrific stuff.
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