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| Straight Razor Shaving | Hits: 44 |
How to shave with a straight razor:
It takes a lot of hands-on experience to learn to shave and maintain a straight razor. A straight razor is a sharp instrument that can quickly turn the water in your shaving basin red with your own blood if you’re not careful.
A straight razor though provides the closest, most comfortable shave that’s available. Using a straight razor is also the purest form of shaving, using the same techniques that have been used for countless generations.
Shaving with a straight razor becomes a morning ritual, perhaps bringing you in touch with long-dead ancestors who began their days in much the same way.
Before scraping that blade across your face you should prepare your beard for shaving. You do this before you shave with any other razor, don't you?
Most of us shower and then shave. Others wash their faces with soap and hot water to remove the oils that accumulate on our whiskers. Most will be familiar with the canned variety available at pharmacies and grocery stores. Still others prefer the traditional brush, soap and mug method.
The best technique is to lather your face after washing and then strop your razor. After stropping, add more lather to your face. This gives that lather time to soften the beard.
Start with your sideburns and cheeks. Hold the blade at an approximately 30 degree angle to your face and push the blade along. As always, use very little pressure—the weight of the blade will be sufficient to remove the stubble—and go very slow.
The cheeks are the easiest place on your face to shave but you should also be able to efficiently shave your chin with practice.
Another important reminder is to keep the skin stretched all the time. Keep your thumb on the blade itself and not on the tang.
The position of the thumb will vary as the different strokes are taken but it must always remain on the blade. Slightly lift the razor as the chin is approached. Use the middle of the blade as you shave the chin.
Do not begin a fresh stroke on a prominent part of the face, such as the chin or jawbone, instead begin a short distance away from them and work toward them with steady strokes.
Shave the right side of the upper lip from the nose toward the corner of the mouth and then shave the left side from the corner of the mouth toward the nose. Leave the center of the lip for last. Lift the nose to tighten the skin and then gently stroke away the hair.
For the lower lip, tighten the skin under the corners of the mouth and gently stroke away the stubble. Remove the rest of the hairs with an upward stroke beginning from the chin and following your face’s contour under the lip.
Once you’re finished shaving, run your hand across your face. Smooth, huh? You can now decide to end shaving and apply aftershave or you can do what professional barbers have called the “second pass.”
A second pass is nothing more than shaving against the grain of your beard using only water and a touch of light wet lather. This is done to get to those resilient tufts of stubble that for one reason or another just don’t want to leave their home.
Go with your beard’s grain. With practice, you’ll be able to shave with a straight razor almost as quickly as you were able to shave with a safety razor. The payoff will be the smoothest and closest shave that’s available.
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