What soap/cream did you use today?

Martin de Candre shaving soap

Stirling Soap Co. Black Pepper Lime Shave Soap

Natural Bay Rum v. (Meißner Tremonia) Jamaica rum, West Indies bay, a hint of citrus, a whiff of clove

If it's West Indian bay you're after, look no further. There may be a drop of citrus and a pinch of clove in the mix, but I hardly pick them up. MT's Natural Bay Rum is mostly tart spicy bay and sweet rum. No fancy fruits or floral froufrou mar the simple accord. For bay rum purists, this could be the gold standard.

Bouki - does it reach your top quartile of performance standards?

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A&E Amber Rose shaving soap. It's good, but I don't like it enough to keep it in my regular rotation, so I'll pass it on to someone else.

I'll take the lid.

Bay Rum t. (Chiseled Face Groomatorium) bay, rum, lime, clove, cinnamon, ginger, pepper, vanilla

In spite of the many notes listed in the description of the fragrance, this bay rum is pretty tame. You won't be troubled by any searing clove or cloying cinnamon. The spices are mild, and they're sandwiched between a lot of other good notes. At first the puck smells sort of plasticky, but the lather is smooth and easy on the nose.

The base is pretty thirsty. I wet my brush several times while loading, and the lather kept drinking down all that I gave it. Next time I'll give it a good drenching and some palm lathering just to see how much juice it can take before breaking.

And the label's pretty nice.

Natural Bay Rum v. (Meißner Tremonia) Jamaica rum, West Indies bay, a hint of citrus, a whiff of clove

Bouki - does it reach your top quartile of  performance standards?

TommyCarioca : I've always had a lot of luck with Meißner Tremonia's hard soaps. For me they make mounds of thick cushioning lather and their finish is especially smooth. MT lathers are not necessarily the slickest (I take mine stiff and on the dry side) but that's not really important to me. I'm happy to use them all year round without hesitation. So, yes, this tub of Natural Bay Rum runs with the best in my stable.

Cold River Schapenmelk Shave Soap

B&M - Beaudelaire

Ivebeen working to get to know a new soap and soap maker, something I rarely do these days. The Soap Maker is Summer Break and the scent is Field Day. Summer Break is a husband/wife team out of Nebraska. Both are professional educators so their company, and the names of the scents, follow the theme about time spent in and around school. The soap I have is a v2 and having never used the v1 I can't speak to any comparisons in that regard. Summer Break is a low structure lather. I mean on-the-deck low structure in my hard water but slickness and cushion are just fine if enough water is added. This is not a soap where the lather is going to jump out of the tub ala Caties Bubbles but is more along the lines of Mystic Waters lather for me. It seems that it's impossible not to make a super shiny lather (or should I say lotion) with this one. Bubbly it AINT. Scent is a nod to school field day and has notes of grass, dirt, water (dew), cedar, florals. To my nose the grass and dirt hit hard as I would suspect with such a name. I also get the florals and cedar but my nose doesn't know what water is supposed to smell like. If it is supposed to smell like morning rather than heat-of-the-day, then they hit it out of the park because as I lather it up on my face, that is the feeling I get. The scent of my morning walk over at the stadium. So I spent the week using the soap with boar, synth, and badger and unsurprisingly, this soap likes synthetic better than my natural hair brushes. Not to say it won't lather with naturals, it does, but synth is much quicker and yields a lather a bit more akin to what most shavers might be familiar with. All my shaves were face lather shaves. The soap itself is medium hard. I load heavier than most I suppose and I used this soap as usual. It seems to prefer a bit wetter brush than I normally hit a puck with and I liked it's performance better with a shaken out brush vs a squeezed one. Lather on the face feels just fine with no tingling or other weird anomalies. Scent strength is about a 6.5/10 and stays pretty constant through the shave. As stated cushion and slickness were on point but I might share that residual slickness is right there with the best. Final rinse is no more difficult than Stirling which is similar in residual slickitude. Where this soap falls short for me is post shave. I have not used many that leave my skin feeling quite so tight as this one on my (I'm guessing) average skin-type face. Not a deal-breaker though as I always use a dab of raw Shea post shave anyway. Conclusions of the week: this soap is certainly protective and slick. It's not the easiest to lather in my water but it isn't a challenge either. The scent really doe stake me on a journey but it's not a journey I crave like the ride Cade takes me on. Post shave is drying but overcomable with a little post shave balm.