An extremely smooth and comfortable shave today — the Yaqi DOC really is an excellent razor, and this little Yaqi brush is quite pleasant: a comfortable handle of nice heft. It comes with two knots, silvertip badger and the synthetic shown, and I find myself using the synthetic much more than the badger. It’s a fine synthetic and feels quite good, plus it makes an excellent lather, this morning the famous Mama Bear lather.

But I was struck particularly by the fragrances. Spellbound Woods is a favorite fragrance, and as I enjoyed lathering — the feel of the brush, the warmth of the lather, the thickness of the lather, and the fragrance of the lather — I got to thinking particularly about the fragrance and how most men are limited to the range of fragrances found in canned foams and shaving gels: a narrow range of bland fragrances.

I imagine marketing directors quickly put the kibosh on any strong or quirky fragrances. Their aim is not to please a portion of the market with a well-defined and assertive fragrance (and thus risk losing a larger portion that may not like the fragrance), but rather to avoid offending anyone. Thus fragrances are muted: the olfactory equivalent of institutional paint colors: off-white, taupe, light grey, pale green.

In contrast, artisan soapmakers go for fragrances that stand out — good example: Stirling Soap Company’s Texas on Fire. Or Chiseled Face’s Summer Storm (or Midnight Stag). Or Phoenix Artisan’s Planet Java Hive (or Cavendish — or Organism 46-B). They know they will only get a segment of shavers in any case, so they are will to play to that and produce fragrances that appeal to a segment.

Marketing directors at big corporations, though, tend to want the whole market, so they avoid anything that might be displeasing to anyone. They try to please everyone, and that is a route to mediocrity. They can get away with it only because shaving fragrances are below the attentional radar of the typical man, who has a lot on his mind: job issues, family well-being under pandemic conditions, political pressures, disease risk, and so on. Most men don’t have the bandwidth to be conscious of something as low-priority as the fragrance they enjoy (or don’t) during their morning shave. If they did pay attention to it, those bland fragrances will wither away quickly: they have nothing to offer — elevator music for the nose.

Beyond Spellbound Woods, I used a little of the Tendre Madeleine Eau de Parfum shown as an aftershave — not a lot, since this is less diluted than an EDT, but enough to provide the pleasure of the fragrance. Fragrantica.net notes:

Tendre Madeleine by Les Senteurs Gourmandes is an Oriental Spicy fragrance for women and men. Tendre Madeleine was launched during the 2000’s. The fragrance features orange, bitter almond, vanilla sugar, Mexican vanilla, spicy notes, and wheat.

You can see why I like it.