This is a terrible shaving soap.

Granted, I had a few clues that this would probably be the case. First off, I don’t think that I’ve ever seen a proper shaving soap that functions well as a shampoo or a bar soap. I mean, they’re both soaps, but intended to be used in completely different manners. 2ndly, the lack of a full ingredient listing doesn’t inspire confidence. 3rdly, the fact that it was made by a local person who clearly specializes in “regular” soaps indicates to me that chances are high that they haven’t looked into what actually makes a quality shaving soap. And last of all, for god sake, they use comic sans as the font on their label.

I should note here that this shouldn’t be confused with the Simple Luxuries soap being sold online out of Newark; they haven’t been foolish enough to claim that their shampoo bars are good for shaving as well.

Anyways, regardless of the fact that I knew it’d probably be terrible, when you’re doing reviews sometimes you just have to take a hit for the team.

The lather was, well, not all that lather-like. It got some decent glide, but was completely unable to sustain any sort of thickness. The stability of what lather I was able to produce was the worst I’ve seen out of anything thus far. Seriously, when I applied it to my face, the lather was degrading at such a rate that I could feel it popping away; kinda tickled.

The scent is fairly nice, but very weak. Sniffing the bar itself, you can smell the sage & the mint, but when lathered up (if you can call it that), you get pretty much nothing on the scent front.

7/10 Scent Pleasantness

4/10 Scent Strength

3/10 Lather Quality

3/10 overall. Don’t think much more needs to be said.

Cost: I purchased this at the Victoria Soap Exchange (link is to a similar but not identical product listing from the same soapmaker). I forget exactly how much I paid, but I think it was around the $6 range, for a 120 g bar that I hope actually works as a body wash / shampoo because otherwise I’m going to have to throw it out. You can’t buy it online, but suffice it to say that you’re not missing out on much.

Gear Used:

Ingredients: No full ingredient listing was given, however the following ingredients are mentioned on the package: Essential oils (mint; sage), Olive Oil, Sweet Almond Oil, Glycerin, Milk, Coconut Oil, Castor Oil. I’m gonna go out on a limb here and assume there was probably also some type of hydroxide, mostly / all sodium being the most likely bet IMHO. Dunno what else is in there.