So I often spend Canada day at a community BBQ / festival along the Gorge inlet. It’s a gorgeous spot (pun intended), and the event is usually quite fun. They’ll have bands playing on the stage, a bunch of food and various other vendors set up along the road, and a classic car show as well. I’m walking along, and notice one of the vendors is a soapmaker. And lo and behold, they’ve got a shaving soap! So, naturally I needed to pick it up.
Unfortunately, it turns out to be pretty terrible.
This soap did not produce a nice thick lather like I prefer. And what little lather I was able to get out of it broke up swiftly. Very swiftly, in fact I think I’m safe in saying that this soap had the worst lather stability of any soap I’ve come across yet. If it wasn’t for the fact that the ingredient listing is slightly different, I’d frankly assume that there was no difference between this and their regular bar soaps. But it definitely appears to have just been made with the ingredients they had on hand, instead of branching out into some of the other fats and oils that tend to make good shaving soaps (stearic acid, tallow, etc) or doing the experimentation that might have been able to get a good balance with the ingredients they were working with. At least the glide was decent, although still far from exemplary.
Scented with lemongrass essential oil, it makes for a pleasant aroma, although it doesn’t start out very strong, and it fades fast… well about as fast as the lather disappears.
- 8/10 Scent Pleasantness
- 6/10 Scent Strength
- 4/10 Lather Quality
Overall, I can’t really recommend this soap. Seems like an example of someone not really doing the research into what’s different between the requirements for regular soap and shaving soap. 4/10.
- Cost: I can’t recall exactly how much I paid, but I reckon it was probably the $5 they’re charging on their etsy site, which gets you a bar in a tin of approximately 2 oz. Also available in cedarwood and lavender.
Gear used:
- Brush: Mühle HJM Black Fibre
- Razor: 1966 Solid Nickel Gillette Tech
- Blade: Astra Superior Platinum
- Scuttle: Robert’s Feats of Clay #4
Ingredients: Water, Palm oil, Coconut oil, Olive oil, Castor oil, Sodium hydroxide (lye), Shea butter, Lemongrass essential oil.
Palpz's Shaving Soap Reviews 