What soap/cream did you use today?

Penhaligon's Blenheim Bouquet shaving cream (vintage)

Darkfall is one of my favorite scents.  It truly does tickle memories of this time of year.  Pinion Pine is a resinous conifer and Southern Idaho is about at the northern boundary of their range.  During the summers when we would be out riding and checking cattle we’d look at the pinions and based on the number and size of the burrs, or cones, we could predict how good the harvest would be.  Seems a wet spring was necessary for a heavy harvest.  At any rate, if the burrs were plentiful and big we would sally forth to the trees in September armed with long handled rakes, long sleeves, and cotton gloves.  We would rake the burrs out of the tops of the trees and collect them in burlap bags and load those bags into the back of the pick-up.  The burrs are green as grass and dripping with resinous sap.  That sap would coat the rakes a d handles, it would saturate your gloves, it would get into your hair and onto your clothing and made collecting the nuts a chore for sure.  But boy how that sap smelled.  Pinion smells like most pines except deeper and more terpinic (is that a word?).  Anyway, after we would get a few hundred pounds of burrs we would call it a day and head home to clean up.  The rakes were stacked in the barn and didn’t have another task because of their stickiness but the bags were also stacked in the barn.  We would build a fire and let it burn to coals, then scrape the coals away and dig a hole.  A bag of burrs would be soaked in water and stuffed into the hole.  More burlap would be added to the top and watered down a d then a layer of dirt/ashes put on that and the coals raked back on top and more wood added to the fire and then we’d let it cook all night.  In the morning that bag would be dug up and the green sappy cones would be brown and opened.  You peel the cone like an artichoke and at the base were two peanut sized nuts.  So tasty!  And the smell?  It was toasted pine saps d Darkfall smells of that to me.  So good.

I decided to try out my new 26mm SHD knot on a soap which directions say to use a badger...SV Stella Alpina.  Thought this was a good day to do so after reading Bouki's and Lipripper660's comments on badger vs synthetic.  I've always noticed that difference as well which was a big reason why l leaned towards synths.  But after today's lather, I have a new perspective.  The soap was bloomed with hot water while I showered (brush was soaked in luke warm water for the same amount of time) and then I loaded for about 20-25 seconds.  I never added more water to the soap and face-lathered for about ten minutes...

That’ll do!

Oceana (Barrister & Mann) floral aquatic
Excelsior ・ Shave 1 ・ 100% left

Clean, powdery, and slightly floral, Oceana is one of those aquatic scents that sort of reminds you of Acqua di Giò. The soap isn’t nearly as flowery as that fragrance, but it follows the same trail. The official notes are salt water, bergamot, sandalwood, and jasmine. In other words, gobs of Calone and musk. Oceana made its debut in the Latha line. Those were nice but fairly simple scents, easy to grasp and easy to like. Of course, the Latha line is defunct now, but Will has resurrected the Oceana scent in his Excelsior base. (Wish he would do the same with Le Petit Chypre!) The lather’s great, no question about that. But I have to admit I’ve never been a big fan of the fragrance. It reminds me too much of dryer sheets. May take a lot of shaving with this soap before I come to terms with it.
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Razor 1963 Gillette Super Speed ・ Blade Big Ben ・ Brush Yaqi R1732 Ferrari ・ Mäurer & Wirtz No. 4711 ・ YTD 616 g

   

DRH Arlington cream -- I'm traveling and this is my travel cream. I always am pleased at how well it works.

MdC Fougere

Floris - n° 89 cream

Just beautiful stuff. Always a fantastic shave and an irresistible scent. It stays in the dopp bag for travel, and gets more stage time than the C&S No. 88 and O&C soaps in the travel sized aluminum dishes. You know what that means. And still, this flies under the radar of the masses.

Ethos Lime - from a sample Frank had sent me.

Martin De Candre Fougere