I want to come back here to Richard's earlier comment about the "let's add another blade" strategy of marketing razors. It's of particular interest to me because I use an old-fashioned safety razor like the one pictured. I love it for all sorts of reasons; but mainly because it reminds me of my grandfather.
Grandad John was born in Bow, within the sound of the famous church bells, which made him a genuine cockney. He was a sheet metal worker, and during the war he moved to Surrey to work at a factory where they made Spitfires. Even though he only served in the Home Guard, he always claimed that he and his mates won the war. "They'd 'ave been in a right state at the Battle of Britain without any bleeding planes, wouldn't they?" he observed.
The only bristles he ever sported came in the form of a spivvy little moustache. The rest of his boat race was never less than impeccably smooth. Occasionally as a small boy I'd stand on the lavatory seat watching him shave in his white vest. I liked the way the cream made him look like Father Christmas. I liked the way his chrome razor winked in the morning light, and the way the blades came in little rectangular parcels that I was never EVER allowed to touch. Wet shaving, then, was both dangerous and slightly illicit.
When I was finally old enough to shave, going electric seemed the safest option. But it always felt like a noisy, hot and depressing experience, and finally I switched to blades. There were only two of them in those days - although the marketers were already pushing the "swivel head" quite hard. It was only a couple of years ago, when the branded female bought me a safety razor for my birthday, that I finally got to emulate Grandad John.
Having swallowed the marketing-speak of people like Gillette, I'd come to believe that using a safety razor must be a time-consuming and possibly painful experience. I imagined the buds of reddening toilet paper that would adorn my chin after wielding one of them. How wrong I was. Handled carefully but with confidence, a safety razor is a precision tool that leaves you with a jaw as smooth as an infant's posterior. But hopefully better looking. Certainly, the branded female always moves in for a nuzzle when I'm done.
Not only that, but the safety razor transforms shaving from a banal experience into a moment of stylishness and nostalgia. And those things are not easy to find in a bathroom before nine in the morning.
PS: I nicked (no pun intended) the picture from a blog called This Sporting Life which is not half bad.
