The London Lounge

What is your favorite shave cream?

Taylors Sandalwood shave soap. Perusing their website, I just noticed that they now offer a sandalwood shave "stick" as well. Perfect for travelling as their interweb site says.

Trumpers rose or sandalwood shaving cream.

Until some five or so years ago, Trumpers Rose Shaving cream. Following some unexplained deterioration in quality (especially the fragrance used - have you recently tried their lime haircream, it smells like lemon scented detergent rather than their excellent extract of limes) followed by an inadequate response from management (it had more than a sniff of cost cutting about it), I am using Floris Santal, but reviewing this in the light of its proliferation into John Lewis.

Taylors is also rather good.

I am still a regular and extremely happy Trumpers customer when it comes to having my hair cut, but in this price range one must adamantly demand the best, and cutting corners will not deliver it. There seems to be a real discrepancy between the quality and commitment of shopfloor staff and management there.

DR Harris for about fifteen years - first their almond and lately their Arlington. Arlington has a very subtle citrus to it - not detergent-like at all.

TVD wrote:... have you recently tried their lime haircream, it smells like lemon scented detergent rather than their excellent extract of limes).

Interesting how our olfactory senses operate. Trumpers wild lime shaving cream evokes detergent to me but the haircream I rather like, finding the scent highly redolent of exotic lime. Although, power of suggestion and all that, now you've mentioned it ...

Certainly, when I started using it many years ago, it was scented with their extract of limes, which I very much like. And then suddenly I got a bottle that was all different, and not in a good way. So I brought it back, and got another one in exchange. Same issue. I had a chat with the store manager, and officially there had been no changes of supplier or manufacturing process. But it is obvious that the fragrance is by far the most expensive input cost and a little tinkering can do wonders to your margins. Strangely enough, somebody else admitted that I had not been the only one to raise quality issues recently. This was about four years ago. I have not bought it since. If I cannot trust management to be sincere with their customers, it is a waste of my time and money. Maybe all is back to normal and these were just transitional issues and you are getting the proper stuff.

What saddens me about the whole thing is that the barbers at Trumpers are a really nice bunch and do an excellent job. And the brand is very strong. But if you start to cut corners, the knowledgeable regulars will go first, and you will be left only with the passing tourist trade. That changes the whole character, and ultimately damages the brand itself. Have a look round the Curzon Street shop. It could really do with a lick of paint. They have been cutting my hair for more than a decade now, and I have a faint sense that standards are slipping.

TVD

I also use Trumper's West India Lime hair cream. Like Whittaker I have not perceived the problems you have mentioned.

As far as Shaving Cream goes, Santa Maria Novella's is very hard to beat.

Cheers

I know many willl be disappointed, but I really prefer one method of shaving and I do not anticipate changing: Mach 3 (or whatever version we are up to), in the shower, and shaving cream from aerosol can.

That said, I tried Kohl's shaving cream (a paste in a tub really) and while I liked it very much, the tub is really inconvenient.

I just got the Santa Maria Novella sent to me from NYC. The package is very disappointing, and the foam itself seems like nothing special. Yet, I seem to be getting fantastically close shaves and I am in the process of trying to figure out if I changed my routine at all to account for this. Otherwise, it is the shave cream. Someone wrote that it is long lasting. I paid $30 dollars with shipping. or that price, it better be.

The best cheap foam I found was Nivea (shave cream, not gel). For some reason I have not seen it for a while.

In any event, assuming my initial observations are correct and the package aside, the SMN does seem very good.

Taylor's is tops for shaving cream as far as I'm concerned. Lovely to apply, rich foam, great scents, long lasting, allows a close shave with no shaving rash. I used to enjoy the shabby charm of the old store.

Spinola

I use Truefitt & Hill Luxury hard soap and DR Harris Arlington

I've been using Kiss My Face for the last five or six years.

http://www.kissmyface.com/

I usually alternate between Proraso and Musgo Real, but tend to use MR more often.

Kiehl's "Close Shavers" Brushless Shave Cream. Softens the beard and skin. A large jar can last a year.

Another good cream is by by Aveno. Also excellent for dry skin.

Trumpers lime