The Dovo Shavette razor
It has been almost a year now since I took up DE shaving or traditional single blade shaving. I must say that I have been enjoying it immensely and it has become a real pampering experience rather than a chore. Nowadays I’m working on my technique, reading about other people’s experiences, watching videos on YouTube and pondering about my next purchases. You could say I’m fast becoming a shaving nerd but it sure is fun. And if the things that you do in life aren’t fun then why do them? Might as well grow a beard. Well, before I spin off into a discussion about work and leisure and how each is defined onwards to the matter in hand – the Dovo Shavette.
Straight Shaving
The straight razor, open razor or cut-throat razor was the way to shave before the safety razor came along. It required skills both in the shaving technique and maintaining the razor itself. The double edged safety razor with its disposable blades made life a lot easier some would say. But proponents of the traditional straight shave argue that the shave is much closer and more satisfying. But as mentioned already it does require some technique. As a hobby shaver my goal is to get the closest shave possible with the least amount of irritation. So even though I have been making good progress with DE shaving, this is something that has been on my shaving to do list.
My plan was to try a slightly more aggressive razor, now that my skills have improved in order to get a closer shave. I’m getting pretty close on most days but feel that it could be a touch closer. I was about to try the Merkur Slant Bar razor and started looking around for a good price. But at the back of my mind entertained the idea of straight shaving.
The Shavette
Having watched a few videos of people straight shaving on YouTube I came across some barber shop videos where the barber used a shavette. A great choice in a barber shop situation where it’s ease of use, convenience and hygiene factor play a big part. This got me thinking. Could this be a way to make the jump from DE shaving to straight shaving? A stepping stone as it were. So instead of spending my money on the Merkur Slant Bar I opted for a Dovo Shavette.
There are many shavettes on the market which use half a normal DE blade. I chose the Dovo due to it’s reputation and good reviews. It was fairly inexpensive and I already had plenty of blades. I got mine from the US via ebay and it arrived in less than a week.
My first shave
Having seen the videos and read a few forum posts about beginners guides to straight shaving I wanted to cut to chase rather than review any of these materials. So I snapped an Astra Keramic blade in half installed it in the shavette and hit the bathroom. Soaked my brush while I showered and then applied very hot water to my face. Made a decent lather with La Toja shaving cream and worked it into my face. And without any other form of preparation I was off.
Cuts, nicks and soreness didn’t stop me. In spite of the pain and mistakes I was enjoying myself but a cautionary voice in my head told me to stop. I had about eight cuts, lots of irritation and the shave itself was not at all close. I washed with cold water and applied witch hazel. Ouch. My face continued to sting for hours.
My second shave
Having gone through an overzealous laceration of my face, which wasn’t as bad as using a disposable bic razor, I was looking forward to my second shave using what I had discovered during the first experience. I noticed that the reasons for my cuts and irritation were incorrect placement of the blade onto the face and applying too much pressure. The other problem was using too many unfamiliar hand positions. I thought I’d just try one main hand position i.e. way of holding the razor that would cover most of the face. I would also only do one pass and finish up with the DE.
When bringing the razor to the face what I did the first time was to place the edge of the blade directly onto the face and then move it. You can see why I got cut so often. I discovered that the technique was to bring the blade as close as possible to the area that was about to be shaved without actually touching the face and then to move it closer once the movement had started. I picked up this technique pretty quickly and came away with only two hairline cuts.
The other thing that I would be working on during this second shave would be minimising irritation. This was all about blade angle coupled with lightness of touch. The Dovo Shavette is very light so all I would have to do would be to make strokes that would be in keeping with the feel of the razor. I reminded myself of the previous day’s irritation and it wasn’t too difficult to keep the pressure low. The other thing was that I wasn’t going to try and shave any difficult areas and perform only one pass, then continue with the Merkur HD.
The resulting shave was a close one with minimum irritation and only two small nicks as mentioned above. I also developed my skills both in holding the razor and making good strokes.
The next shaves and future training
So I have my shavette training all mapped out for the next few weeks. What I plan to do is much the same as the second shave i.e. a combination of the shavette and DE razor. But each time I’m going to try and learn a new part of the face with the shavette. So the amount of area covered with the shavette will gradually increase until I can do the full shave with it. I thought that this would be a huge learning curve but it actually doesn’t seem that far away.