Tags
6/10, bergamot, cedarwood, citrus, clove, garden variety soap co, juniper, Lime, patchouli, shaving soap, wood
So I received this puck of shaving soap after getting an inquiry from the soap maker about doing a review. I frankly kind of wish she had contacted me prior to coming up with the formulation; perhaps I could have helped to steer her in a bit of a better direction.
As we often see from people who are already making soap that decide to delve into making shaving soaps, it looks like it’s basically hand soap with bentonite clay added. I suppose I can’t blame them terribly; after all that’s pretty much what comes up on the first page or so if you google “How to make shaving soap”. The problem being that they’re all listed on soap oriented websites, and not anyone with any real “cred” with regards to shaving. I’d liken it to someone who was trying to figure out how to bake a cake following a recipe on an breakfast website telling egg lovers how they can alter their omelet recipe by adding some flour, instead of actually listening to the advice on a baking site.
Which isn’t to say that some type of clay can’t be a small component of a good shaving soap (as seen in Mike’s Naturals amongst others), but it sure as heck can’t be the only thing that you’re using to try and make it into a shaving soap instead of something else.
Anyways, enough of a generic rant, about this soap in particular: it seriously lacked lather stability. If you do use it, I’d suggest tailoring your lather mix to be on the water-heavy side, so at least you get a very good amount of glide, since you’re not really going to be able much to speak about in the way of thickness. It did at least have some decent moisturization properties, but that’s not really enough to salvage the performance.
The scent was pleasant; the bergamot seems to be predominate with the cedar and the other scents providing a nice base. There’s a bit of sweetness to the mix as well, which might be from the shea / cacao butter. All together, it came together for a nice combination.
It was about a middling strength; not strong, but not weak, with fairly decent staying power.
- 9/10 Scent Pleasantness
- 8/10 Scent Strength
- 6/10 Lather Quality
Anyways, I’ll be giving this a 6/10; I can’t really recommend it due to the unsatisfying shave it provided.
- Cost: As mentioned, I was given this puck free of charge for the purposes of this review. You can get your own 4 oz puck for $8.
Gear used:
- Brush: The Colonel
- Razor: Merkur 37C Slant
- Blade: Personna DE
- Scuttle: Robert’s Feats of Clay #4
Ingredients: Water, Sunflower Oil, Castor oil, Coconut oil, Sodium Hydroxide, Palm Oil, Shea Butter, Cacao Butter, Bentonite Clay, Essential Oil Blend (bergamot, cedarwood, juniper, patchouli, lime, clove)
Palpz's Shaving Soap Reviews 
I was never very good at math, but let me see if I can get this right: 9/10, 8/10, and 6/10 somehow averages to 6/10 overall. Hmm. What is wrong with this equation? As well, you seem to spend nearly half (again, I’m not great at math, but it seems like half) your article in a general rant against soap makers who delve into making shaving soap (as if this is some rare atmosphere to be reached only by the elite soap maker) and very little on the soap itself. Your credibility is stretched thin here.
> I was never very good at math, but let me see if I can get this right: 9/10, 8/10, and 6/10 somehow averages to 6/10 overall. Hmm. What is wrong with this equation?
As outlined on my about page, the overall score is an average of the scent and the lather scores. The scent score is obtained by multiplying the strength by the pleasantness. .9 * .8 = .72, averaged with the 0.6, and in this case I decided to round down.
> your article in a general rant against soap makers who delve into making shaving soap
Yes, because they often seem to make not very good soap, in a similar fashion, which ends up resulting in soaps like this. I fail to see how identifying how this soap is part of a common trend somehow invalidates its assessment.
I’m not sure how many paragraphs you expect me to devote to a lather that just didn’t hold up at all. There’s only so much one can say about something that dissipates swiftly.
Whatever. That’s probably the most contrived formula and reasoning I’ve ever heard.