First a comment on the razor: it’s the iKon Shavecraft #102 slant, and it’s a loaner: iKon sent me a copy before the razor’s been released (and perhaps while they are still tinkering with production issues), and I will be returning it.
I will say it arrived very well packaged indeed: every part was in a separate plastic bag, mostly small zip-lock bags enclosed in bigger plastic bags.
But let’s start with my new Wickham shaving soap, the Garden Mint fragrance. This is a soft mint fragrance, rather than a sharp peppermint. The Wife said it reminded her of the fragrance of Butter Cream Mints. I ordered this from the UK, unaware at the time that BullgooseShaving.com carries Wickham shaving soap. The soap is relatively soft, and the large-diameter puck make loading my Rod Neep brush a breeze. (The brush is a one-off, and I had him embed in the base of the handle a coin minted in my birth year.) Shown in the photo is the very nice thank-you note that came with the order.
The lather was thick, creamy, luxurious, and fragrant. This is a top-drawer soap, and it sells at quite a modest price for a soap of this quality. Highly recommended.
I washed my beard with my mix of Dr. Bronner’s Rose Castile soap and emu oil, then applied the lather and picked up the Shavecraft slant, loaded with a new Personna Lab Blue blade. The handle is somewhat short, but this is a three-piece razor, so you can swap in a longer handle if you want. (BTW, those who complain that their hands cramp if the handle’s short: the problem is not the length of the handle but the tightness of the grip: if you grip too tightly, your hand will indeed cramp, whether you’re gripping a razor or a pencil (writer’s cramp) or the handle of a sword. My fencing instructor told us to hold the sword as we would hold a bird: firmly enough that it doesn’t escape, but not so firmly we would injure the bird. Same with razors.)
The iKon slant (the taller one shown in the photos below) twists the blade in two directions, and thus the alignment studs must allow a certain amount of play because the blade moves as it’s twisted. This means that you should load the razor carefully (as shown in this video) and also verify that the cutting edge is parallel to the cap’s edge.
The Shavecraft #102, however, bends the blade in the same way a regular straight-bar razor does: bending it over the hump in the baseplate to make it rigid (cf. how a metal tape measure has a bend to give it rigidity). Thus the alignment studs do not allow the same amount of play. The #102 is a humpback slant, like the Walbusch slant shown in these photos from an earlier SOTD. The humpback design means that the cap has a “right” and a “wrong” orientation, similar to the Merkur Progress, and like the Progress, one end of the cap and one end of the baseplate are marked: the two marks match in the correct orientation:
One effect of the “no-twist” blade mounting is that, unlike slants that twist the blade, the Shavecraft slants one direction on one side:
And in the opposite direction on the other side:
This is the same on the Walbusch already mentioned. Before I tried this kind of asymmetrical slant, I thought it would feel odd and perhaps make sideburn trimming difficult. Once again I learned that expectations are not a reliable guide: in fact, humpbacked razors work quite well and I cannot tell, as I shave, which direction the slant is going—and my sideburns are trimmed square.
As to the shave itself: perfection. Very smooth, very easy, no nicks, no burn, and I like the razor a lot. I’ll probably buy one later on. (Shameless plug of blog.) I also think I’ll probably use it with a different handle, somewhat longer, though the current handle was not a problem.
Fit, finish, and workmanship were excellent. The razor should become popular, especially if men heed my advice to get a slant for their second razor.
Three passes—WTG, XTG, ATG—a final rinse, dry, and a good splash of Saint Charles Shave’s Very V aftershave, one that I like a lot. It doesn’t have a heavy fragrance, but occasionally during the day you’ll catch a whiff of the fragrance: extremely pleasant.
Filed under: Shaving
