Avoid brush damage .....

This is good advice:

Avoid brush damage and protect your investment.

Styptic pencil

However careful you are, occasionally you will nick or cut yourself while shaving. I did today, so I was really pleased I had one of these little sticks in my stash:

I got mine in my local Superdrug store.

Lathe turned handles

You often see references to shaving brushes having lathe turned handles as a badge of distinction. But there is a world of difference between handles turned out on lathes which are preset to produce large numbers of identical handles compared with those individually shaped with hand tools on an old fashioned lathe.

Here's a CNC lathe:

This will produce handles very cheaply to a high consistent standard.

This is the old fashioned lathe used to produce New Forest Brushes handles:

Each handle is individually made using hand tools to shape. Turning handles to a consistently high standard is a skilled job and it's labour intensive and the main reason why these hand made brushes will be more expensive to make compared with those made on automated lathes.

So when you see references to lathe turned handles - it's only part of the story.

And then there was none.

All gone at last. No more of any Coates creams remain in the Fido stash.

A sad day

Gone. Last shave with it today.Now long discontinued. this was one of the very best creams from an old established English brand. If you ever find an unused pot, snap it up. Even if a bit hydrated, it will still deliver fine lather.

Straight razors

I never cease to be amazed by the amount of work Mantic puts in to help fellow shavers. Take a look at this recent article in his Sharpologist newsletter:

Straight razors