Paste & Cut Travelling Box No. 5

Rami said:
And the eagle has landed. :)

Man it’s tough. There is a lot of variety here, the box was bulging.

So to make the selection process easier I will not go for any soap I have tried before. So no APR or B&M. So after taking a good sniff back in the box they go. ( regretfully)

As an aside Fenchurch and mycoft, as well as cologne russe are on my buy list ( once I finish some soap). And I deeply regret not jumping on Idoru when I had the chance.

Anyway here are the final selection, it’s a bit light on aftershaves as I am not good at mixing and matching.

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One last note

This thing is not for me, good luck to whomever tries it

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Now I am off for a shower and a shave :)
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The Veg has its first victim!!!
 
First shave,

Wholly kaw, not bad; lather is on par with apr which is my go to. Soap is a bit soft. Scent is subjective and I don’t have a great nose so no comment.

First menthol in a splash, very cooling. Can see why some people get addicted to it. May need to go bother @todras for some festivus
 
Second shave.

Squadron scramble followed by the clubman green

Added what I thought was a reasonable amount of soap to the bowl and ended up with a enough decent lather for 2 shaves. Lather itself was very nice.

The clubman felt nice and light the smell didn’t really grab me but a few minutes later it’s settling down to something nicer.

Second shave with the platinum and not really happy one more shave and out it goes.
 
Rami said:
Second shave.

Squadron scramble followed by the clubman green

Added what I thought was a reasonable amount of soap to the bowl and ended up with a enough decent lather for 2 shaves. Lather itself was very nice.

The clubman felt nice and light the smell didn’t really grab me but a few minutes later it’s settling down to something nicer.

Second shave with the platinum and not really happy one more shave and out it goes.
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Any updates on other things you have tried mate?
 
Mark1966 said:
Any updates on other things you have tried mate?
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Third shave. Skipped as I was in a rush, used my own as I can enjoy the box when I have time.

Today’s shave p&b Imperial Rum, smelled of cardamom to me. Not bad. Took a while to lather but lather was ok. Haven’t tried an aftershave and to be honest didn’t need one.

Changed blade to the Gillette’s and my first thought is ahhh. I am going to need to stock up.
 
After a welcome Australia Day break, back to the daily grind.

Had a quick shower and the mystic water soap.

Verdict: not bad.

Now that I am a few soaps in. I am noticing that prep and technique counts for much more than the actual gear.

I can tell the difference between lathers but they have no impact to the quality or ease of the shave. Some lather easier and some smell better but nothing have been eye opening this far. This is going to endup curing my SAD.
 
That sounds equally good and bad.

Pro: Not having to spend $$$ and time on products
Finally reaching the destination of contentment.
Con: Isn't it all about the journey.
Finding something else that you will spend $$$ and time on.
 
Today’s shave eufros chronos

Smell: didn’t really like not sure why I picked it out of the box

Lather, very photogenic. Simply looked so well hydrated that it oozes; stuff I normally see in the lather thread.

Performance: see last post.

I think I got more improvement going for a hot shower before hand rather than the soaps themselves selfs. But some unexplained reason I would buy one of these once I run out of soap.
 
Blackbeard.

Slightly slicker than the rest and a good shave was had. Little bit softer too.

And now the mighty box leaves the den. Sadly so, I could have done with another week tbh
 
Thanks again to @Mark1966 for organising this and the generosity of all the contributors. We are really lucky to have the opportunity to try out all these great products.

Shave 1: Tallow & Steel Himalaya Soap and Aftershave (SOTD pic is here)
I started off bowl lathering to build up the lather before switching to lather on my face to help with the pre-shave. This soap feels luxurious going on. This was my first time using a high end soap and the difference was apparent. I continued gradually giving the soap more and more water, it showed no signs of breaking down.
My first pass using the Karve F plate and a new Nacet whipped through my whiskers without a hitch, the lather was excellent - slick and protective. Residual slickness after first pass was great.
Lathered up for the second pass adding a bit more water to the brush tips to keep the lather nice and slick. Second pass with touch up was very smooth, no issues.
At this stage in my shave, I squeeze the remaining lather from my brush with my hand and hand lather my face leaving the lather there while I wash out the sink, clean my brush and razor. I find this stage telling for some soaps in that I can feel my face sting from leaving the lather on my face after completing the shave. Always a good sign to me when there is no such stinging, it generally means my face and the soap can get along.
Rinse off with cold water and applied the aftershave. This smelt slightly different from the soap to me, it reminded me of Drambuie - a Scotch whisky liquor. The aftershave went on a bit greasy for my liking (could have been I used too much) but after a few minutes the greasiness was gone. No sting on application of the splash, no signs or feeling of irritation on my skin and that included going ATG on my lower neck so full marks there. Some soaps seems to result in a closer shave than others and this was a super-close shave, it'll be a couple of days before my whiskers grow back enough to shave again!
One of the things I hear often about these high end soaps is that the ingredients are so good for your skin you don't need post-shave moisturising products like balms. I intentionally did not apply my usual Nivea Sensitive Post Shave balm to check this out for myself. After about an hour my face was still feeling fine so maybe it's true.
The scent of the soap was not unpleasant but I wouldn't be rushing out to buy it. The soap base on the other hand I was very impressed with and if I found a scent I really liked I would buy it (maybe Boreal or Morocco or West Indies, they sound nice). Overall a very enjoyable irritation-free BBS shave with Tallow & Steel.
 
ShaveOn said:
Thanks again to @Mark1966 for organising this and the generosity of all the contributors. We are really lucky to have the opportunity to try out all these great products.

Shave 1: Tallow & Steel Himalaya Soap and Aftershave (SOTD pic is here)
I started off bowl lathering to build up the lather before switching to lather on my face to help with the pre-shave. This soap feels luxurious going on. This was my first time using a high end soap and the difference was apparent. I continued gradually giving the soap more and more water, it showed no signs of breaking down.
My first pass using the Karve F plate and a new Nacet whipped through my whiskers without a hitch, the lather was excellent - slick and protective. Residual slickness after first pass was great.
Lathered up for the second pass adding a bit more water to the brush tips to keep the lather nice and slick. Second pass with touch up was very smooth, no issues.
At this stage in my shave, I squeeze the remaining lather from my brush with my hand and hand lather my face leaving the lather there while I wash out the sink, clean my brush and razor. I find this stage telling for some soaps in that I can feel my face sting from leaving the lather on my face after completing the shave. Always a good sign to me when there is no such stinging, it generally means my face and the soap can get along.
Rinse off with cold water and applied the aftershave. This smelt slightly different from the soap to me, it reminded me of Drambuie - a Scotch whisky liquor. The aftershave went on a bit greasy for my liking (could have been I used too much) but after a few minutes the greasiness was gone. No sting on application of the splash, no signs or feeling of irritation on my skin and that included going ATG on my lower neck so full marks there. Some soaps seems to result in a closer shave than others and this was a super-close shave, it'll be a couple of days before my whiskers grow back enough to shave again!
One of the things I hear often about these high end soaps is that the ingredients are so good for your skin you don't need post-shave moisturising products like balms. I intentionally did not apply my usual Nivea Sensitive Post Shave balm to check this out for myself. After about an hour my face was still feeling fine so maybe it's true.
The scent of the soap was not unpleasant but I wouldn't be rushing out to buy it. The soap base on the other hand I was very impressed with and if I found a scent I really liked I would buy it (maybe Boreal or Morocco or West Indies, they sound nice). Overall a very enjoyable irritation-free BBS shave with Tallow & Steel.
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Excellent write up, using a top tier really makes a difference to me too. Lathering, slickness and post shave combinations that always exceed a general soap.
Have quite a few T+S products and their scents are polarising. And happy to share my thoughts when asked.
The Himalayas soap on first use is meh by the scent profile but as it opens up with the smoke tar layers and resins it will wow you. Unfortunately a winter scent and will be a heavy profiled scent for summer. Subtle scent but lingers.
Go easy on the post shave, generally a few drops on wet hands.
Also stay away from Maya as the spices used (again) cause reations for some. And yes there are two more of T+S's to stay away from and that was their Coca-cola tribute and the last Xmas scent late last year, which they got in trouble for, just Google it if unawares, so don't highjack the thread with T+S bashing crap.

Madagascar would be the next one I'd get.

Look forward to the rest of your P&C traveling kit thoughts (y)
 
Shave 2: Declaration Grooming TSM Fougère Soap and Aftershave (SOTD pic is here)
I set about this shave following the same routine as described in my previous post. All hardware unchanged for consistency. Spooning a small amount of the shave soap out into my lather bowl, I was immediately struck by how soft and sticky this soap is. I would go as far as to say this is a cream rather than a soap; I’ve had tubs of TOBS in the past that have been harder than this.

Moving along, the soap lathered easily producing a nice creamy lather. After doing some extra lathering on my face, I started my first pass using the Karve F plate loaded with my usual Nacet blade. While the lather was slick, it was not the protective lather I’ve come to expect from my shave soaps. By the end of the second pass, I had a few (uncustomary) little nicks.

Could this have been down to user error? Of course. However I don’t feel I was being careless or using pressure. 9/10 shaves I escape nick-free but had 3 or 4 minor nicks after this shave. To me, the lather was more reminiscent of that from a cream (very slick, not so protective) rather than a soap (slick and protective). Out of curiosity I checked the ingredients and found that tallow was listed seventh – quite a way down. Most of the soaps I use tend to have tallow listed in the first three ingredients if not the very first. I think this may be part of the reason for lather being less protective.

After applying the remaining lather to my face by hand and cleaning up my gear, I rinsed off with cold water and applied the aftershave. A slight sting on application followed by a nice menthol kick which my face appreciated. The aftershave smells great in the bottle but I found the scent quite weak on my face. It didn’t have anything near the staying power of the T&S Himalaya I had used last shave. Apart from that the aftershave went on nice, no greasiness, and there was no signs or feeling of skin irritation. The end result was again a very close BBS however the post shave feel was not so good. I did not apply the Nivea Sensitive Post Shave balm straight after the shave but within an hour or so my skin was crying out for it.

My overall impression for this soap and splash combo is one of disappointment. I have seen a lot of this soap/splash over the past months on the forum. The packaging and presentation is so good that you think the soap must be good too. It is good, but based on this shave at least, it’s not great. This is what is so great about the P&C Travelling Box – you get to try out some of these tempting products before splashing the cash. Now I can mark this one off my wish list.
 
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