Final thoughts for the passaround. Ended up with four total shaves. First shave was great as explained in my previous post.
Second shave - for the blade I stayed with the Gillette platinum on its second use. Decided to try out the WK cream for this shave. The scent is a nice warm tobacco scent. It is very soft and whipped feeling, as expected from a cream. It lathers quickly into a dense shiny lather. I learned to not add as much water as you would for a soap, because it starts to lose some slickness. I shaved one side with the OC and the other side with SB. I had two days growth for this shave. The shave was smooth but I finished up with some irritation, and the alum lit me up after. The bare naked toner was comforting and soothed the irritation. The shave was close and long lasting, but my face did feel a little raw at the end of the day.
Third shave - Decided to change it up and try a nacet for this shave, hoping to tame the irritation. Chose the "Valentynka" soap for this shave. The scent is suttle but very nice smelling. It didn't seem too floral to me, but was just nice smelling. It smelled similar to one of my girlfriends perfumes, but more masculine. As previously states, siero is a pheonominal base and performed as expected. This shave was the worst unfortunately, which I blamed on the blade. Super tuggy and felt like the razor was barely cutting. I ended up doing a quick second pass with another razor to get an acceptable shave. Face was lit up by the alum again and I had quite a bit of irritation.
Fourth shave - I didn't want to quit on a bad shave, and decided to give it another go with a feather. This was only on one days growth, and I chose to only do one WTG pass. Soap of choice was the Vor V. This soap evolves quite a bit while lathering. Off the puck its mostly raspberry and has an almost household cleaner type smell. But once lathered it turns into a beautifully balanced scent. Single pass with the new feather was smooth and efficient. It was a socially acceptable shave and exactly what I was looking for. Unfortunately the alum still lit up my face, which at this point is more than likely the geometry of the razor. Vor V AS splash had some burn but soothed the irritation shortly after.
Regardless of the shave characteristics for me, this is a beautiful razor. It is presented well, feels good in the hand, is beautifully polished, and is low profile. This is the third version of this razor I've tried (17-4 and Ti passarounds previously) and the results have been similar each time. Something about this razor just doesn't work for me. That doesn't mean it won't work for you, made obvious by the tons of other satisfied shavers. The WK products were great as well. The soaps were nicely scented although I probably will not end up purchasing them. It was more of a "like not love" relationship with the scents. The cream on the other hand was a huge surprise and I could see some in my den in the near future. For the rushed early morning shaves, it lathers much quicker than any of my soaps and provides as good a shave. Everything is sanitized, packaged, and sent off to the next member. Thank you to "
DanLaw" and "
whollykaw" for sponsoring this passaround, it was very enjoyable. Now for some pics!