Well it's only been a week or so, but I think I can make a call on the Simmo's Classic.
It's very good, but not perfect.
When I first got the Chub, I really didn't get on with it. But I kept at it, thinking I could adjust. I couldn't, and I couldn't be arsed to work at it, so it sat unused for months at a time. I just want stuff that works. Pick up any soap, load the brush, go. The Chub was never like that for me, and I kept it to creams. It was just one finicky fucker. But the forum love for them is immense, so maybe I'm the finicky fucker.
I must pitstop for a bit of a whinge about Mark @ Simmo's advice. It's pretty half-hearted these days, unless, you're asking for the bespoke, like rare, albino, virgin snowboarding badger in a $300+ knot. I realise he's CEO and has bigger things to do, but he's also marketing his gear, and judging by his extensive online presence, is well aware it's people far more afflicted by an addiction to shave goods than myself, who are the main reason his business still exists in this age of canned goo and designer gels. 18 months ago when I expressed reservations about buying a Chubby, he said don't worry, they get easier to use over time. It didn't. When I emailed him a few weeks ago and gave him a very brief, but concise request on what to replace it with, suggesting a couple I thought may suit, he provided the briefest answers possible that he thought I wanted to hear. I guess answering brush nerds who buy/collect swags of his stuff, has jaded him. That's not me (anymore).
The point here being, the Classic 1 is the brush I should have been advised to get when I asked him way back, about a smallish brush, similar to the Berk, but with a bit more grunt. A Berk 2.0, if you like. The CL2 might even be closer to that original request, factory specs on the CL1 are 22/44, CL2, 23/44, and a Chub is 23/47, but the thing that makes the difference is the stuffedness, Classics aren't stuffed as fat as Chubbys – nothing is.
The CL1 works easy peasy on soft and hard soap - creams are a given. It whips up lather faster than a Chub, and doesn't hide half of it inside. Because it's not as dense, air, water, and soap can flow better. Meaning I can get on with shaving and not fuck around getting the lather right, which was the bane of the Chub. No, it doesn't have the grunt of a Chub, but I'll take ease of use over that every day of the week.
The handle isn't big. The Berk's is small at around 45mm - the CL is smaller. This means the handle fits all in your hand, so it feels like you and a knot of badger, which some won't like at all. This would be a great knot in something like a small Persian jar, or like my Vulfix 376 that PJ superbly fitted with a TGN Finest knot. This CL1 is pretty damn close to that - for three times the cost and half the handle, mind you.
So I got pretty much to what I wanted to buy this time, a badger to rest up Dad's Vulfix, that I like using, and just works.
It's very good, but not perfect.
When I first got the Chub, I really didn't get on with it. But I kept at it, thinking I could adjust. I couldn't, and I couldn't be arsed to work at it, so it sat unused for months at a time. I just want stuff that works. Pick up any soap, load the brush, go. The Chub was never like that for me, and I kept it to creams. It was just one finicky fucker. But the forum love for them is immense, so maybe I'm the finicky fucker.
I must pitstop for a bit of a whinge about Mark @ Simmo's advice. It's pretty half-hearted these days, unless, you're asking for the bespoke, like rare, albino, virgin snowboarding badger in a $300+ knot. I realise he's CEO and has bigger things to do, but he's also marketing his gear, and judging by his extensive online presence, is well aware it's people far more afflicted by an addiction to shave goods than myself, who are the main reason his business still exists in this age of canned goo and designer gels. 18 months ago when I expressed reservations about buying a Chubby, he said don't worry, they get easier to use over time. It didn't. When I emailed him a few weeks ago and gave him a very brief, but concise request on what to replace it with, suggesting a couple I thought may suit, he provided the briefest answers possible that he thought I wanted to hear. I guess answering brush nerds who buy/collect swags of his stuff, has jaded him. That's not me (anymore).
The point here being, the Classic 1 is the brush I should have been advised to get when I asked him way back, about a smallish brush, similar to the Berk, but with a bit more grunt. A Berk 2.0, if you like. The CL2 might even be closer to that original request, factory specs on the CL1 are 22/44, CL2, 23/44, and a Chub is 23/47, but the thing that makes the difference is the stuffedness, Classics aren't stuffed as fat as Chubbys – nothing is.
The CL1 works easy peasy on soft and hard soap - creams are a given. It whips up lather faster than a Chub, and doesn't hide half of it inside. Because it's not as dense, air, water, and soap can flow better. Meaning I can get on with shaving and not fuck around getting the lather right, which was the bane of the Chub. No, it doesn't have the grunt of a Chub, but I'll take ease of use over that every day of the week.
The handle isn't big. The Berk's is small at around 45mm - the CL is smaller. This means the handle fits all in your hand, so it feels like you and a knot of badger, which some won't like at all. This would be a great knot in something like a small Persian jar, or like my Vulfix 376 that PJ superbly fitted with a TGN Finest knot. This CL1 is pretty damn close to that - for three times the cost and half the handle, mind you.
So I got pretty much to what I wanted to buy this time, a badger to rest up Dad's Vulfix, that I like using, and just works.
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