Decided to do a few days of #ForgottenAmmo and to use soaps that I have but haven’t used in rotation or just left alone after several rounds not even going into my night shave rotations.
The Village Soapsmith’s soaps are one of those, I have a few, they were relatively cheap and are middle road in performance.
Slick enough, but not melted butter on baby’s butt slick, has OK post shave and residual slickness but after using other really good artisan soaps, felt lacking. Scent which could have pushed it up higher in my “to use” list is instead on the low end, you do smell the soap on the initial lather but it quickly becomes “unscented” almost as soon as you paint on the lather or as in today, while making the lather during face lathering. It’s there but very, very light.
Think of Proraso creams without Proraso scent strength.
To be fair, I do have a rather large choice of really good artisan soaps, otherwise I would probably have enjoyed these soaps more and like Proraso (with the exception of Green and Wood and Spice) will phase out of my den.
*****
I have to say that I am very impressed with Zaharoff.
Not only with the scent (I’ll get to that later) but as a company.
Above is a free sample that they sent what over to me here in Singapore. I have received samples before, but never felt the person sending them actually took the time to make it personal.
This speaks far more about the people behind the company and the quality I can come to expect.
Scent notes are :
Top Notes : Black Pepper, Cardamom, Pear, Lavender, Cypress
Mids : Ginger, Cedar, Oud, Iris, Pimento, Fir Balsam
Base : Sandalwood, Patchouli, Black Amber, Myrrh and Frankincense
Initial application out of the shower and the opening comes off as fresh and spicy with the pepper and cardamom notes being chased with ginger bleeding into the top notes giving it a fresh zing.
On the dry down, the notes settles into mainly an oud, sandalwood, spice and amber scent with the other notes popping in and out, chasing the mid and base.
My initial guesstimated assessment of it I think is spot on, this is a modern day scent that marries the complexity of scents of old. Think YSL La Nuit De L’Homme and Creed’s venerable Royal Oud put into a blender and mixed with some notes added, some notes removed and you have Zaharoff’s Signature.
Make no mistake though, the scent is its own uniquely wonderfully masculine yet sensuous beast.
Final Test later, when they wife comes home and I have my evening shave. 😈
Regardless, this will be on my buy list, actually, probably in a day or two.
Thanks Tim, this is definitely a must buy.
*****
Oh yeah. Perfect no irritation BBS….yada yada.. what you’d expect from using the Oren.
- Pre-shave : Shower
- Brush : Oumo SHD Silvertip Badger
- Soap : The Village Soapsmith Eucalytus and Mint
- Razor : Occam’s Razor Oren Nano Enhanced w/Feather Pro Blades (2)
- Post Shave : Aqua Velva
- Others : Zaharoff Signature Pour Homme Sample
Steve's Wet Shaving in Singapore 