Elvado – Madera Almond Shaving Soap

Tags

8/10, Almond, elvado, shaving soap

My next review from Elvado is their Madera Almond Shaving Soap. Seems like named it’s after the county / city of Madera California, where I believe they get the almond essential oils used to scent the soap.

The formulation appears to be exactly the same as the previous soap of theirs that I’ve tried (well, other than the scent part), with no real discernible difference in the performance, as expected. It’s a fairly good melt and pour. It does require a fair bit of water to get up to optimal performance, along with some elbow grease. Gives a good glide with just a tad less thickness than I usually like. And it left my face feeling nice and moisturized after the fact.

The scent is a classic Italian-style sweet almond, like Cella et al. It’s quite pleasant. The strength is good, coming on fairly strong, albeit with some noticeable fading going on before I was done each pass.

• 9/10 Scent Pleasantness
• 8/10 Scent Strength
• 8/10 Lather Quality

The verdict? 8/10. It’s pretty good, and probably fairly competitive when stacked against most other almond scented products I’ve tried.

• Cost: I was provided this tub free for the purposes of the review by the folks at Elvado. At the time I write this, everywhere appears to be out of stock of the version in the tub, it looks like you can still get the 71 g shaving stick for $14.96.

Gear used:

• Brush: Mühle HJM Black Fibre
• Razor: Edwin Jagger DE81BL (Red)
• Blade: Polsilver Super Iridium
• Scuttle: Robert’s Feats of Clay #4

Ingredients: Cocos Nucifera (Coconut Oil), Elaesis Guineensis (Palm Oil) , Cathamus Tintorius (Safflower Oil), Glycerine (Kosher of vegetable origin), Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea Butter), Purified Water, Fragrance (Parfum 100% Natural), Sodium Hydroxide, Sorbitol, Sorbitan Oleate, Glycine Soja (Soy Bean Protein), Titanium Dioxide (Mineral Whitener)

Elvado – Key Lime Shaving Soap

Tags

9/10, citrus, elvado, Lime, mint, shaving soap

Next up on the list of new soaps, one that’s actually new, instead of just new to me. I think I first heard about Elvado a couple months back, after hearing about them working with Seth over at Men Essentials for the creation of a line of Men Essentials branded soaps. Their parent company seems to have actually started out as a medical supply company, before branching out into skin care, and then shaving “software”. One interesting little tidbit I guess!

Anyhow, their Elvado line of shaving soaps seems to be a modified version of a melt-and-pour base, with the addition of a fair bit of shea butter. Rather akin to Honeybee Soaps in that regard, and to be honest, the performance reminded me of it as well. First off, you do need to use a fair bit of water, and some elbow grease to get what I’d say is a good balance of thickness and glide; I found I generally had to sacrifice a bit of thickness in order to get the glide I needed. As this also mostly fixed the lather stability issues I found the soap had at lower water contents. So, yeah, don’t be stingy!

One area in which I think it performed a fair bit better than Honeybee soaps was the moisturization; my face felt better afterwards that I recall getting from Sue’s product.

I’m not sure why they named it “Key Lime”, as I wouldn’t think just from the name that the scent includes a mint aroma.  Maybe shoulda called it “Key Lime Mojito”?! But it most certainly does, and the lime and the mint smells do come together exceptionally nicely. They’re balanced great, such that neither overpowers or dominates the other.

As for the strength of the scent? I’d say just about perfect. It was nice and strong when first applied, without being overpowering, and saw very little in the way of fading.

• 9/10 Scent Pleasantness
• 10/10 Scent Strength
• 8/10 Lather Quality

Anyways, overall I’m rather pleased with the performance of this soap. I feel reasonably comfortably rounding up to a 9/10.

• Cost: I was provided this tub free for the purposes of the review by the folks at Elvado. You can get a 115 g tub for $16, or if you find them more convenient, a 71 g shaving stick for the same price.

Gear used:

• Brush: Ecotools Kabuki Finishing Brush
• Razor: Vintage Bakelite Slant (with iKon handle)
• Blade: Asco Super Stainless
• Bowl: Hand painted by myself (Yes, I know it’s ugly).

Ingredients: Cocos Nucifera (Coconut Oil), Elaesis Guineensis (Palm Oil) , Cathamus Tintorius (Safflower Oil), Glycerine (Kosher of vegetable origin), Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea Butter), Purified Water, Fragrance (Parfum 100% Natural), Sodium Hydroxide, Sorbitol, Sorbitan Oleate, Glycine Soja (Soy Bean Protein), Titanium Dioxide (Mineral Whitener)