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Ramblings of a MilkCrate

Great Shave Tim! I have never smelled the Stirling Ben Franklin...let us know what it smells like!
 
Nice shave Tim...Ben Franklin was definitely a unique smell, a little outside of my wheel house.
 
dangerousdon said:
Great Shave Tim! I have never smelled the Stirling Ben Franklin...let us know what it smells like!
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Interesting and unique are probably some good descriptions. My sense of smell is not very good but some people describe the smell like root beer through a leather straw (now sure how that works). I thought I smelled something root beer(ish) towards the end of the day yesterday. Maybe it smells like that when it's fading, but that's not the dominant smell for me. I'm not sure what I smell, maybe the Frankincense, but it is different. This would be one that's best to try a sample of first. With that said, it may be a one and done for me. I have tried several of their samples, but haven't found "the one" yet.

Time to order more samples.
 
Nice shave. You can never go wrong ordering lots of Stirling samples.
 
Last week I mentioned to my wife the sale price of Proraso Red at TJ Max. We don’t shop there, but she was in town shopping on Tuesday. She saw a TJ Max and went in. Scored the last tub of Proraso Red for me. She’s a keeper!
 
MilkCrate said:
Last week I mentioned to my wife the sale price of Proraso Red at TJ Max. We don’t shop there, but she was in town shopping on Tuesday. She saw a TJ Max and went in. Scored the last tub of Proraso Red for me. She’s a keeper!
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She is indeed!
 
Great shave, Tim! The Ben Frnaklin soap definitely caught my attention awhile ago, so it's good to seem someone's opinion of it.
 
Great score on the Proraso by your wife!

And regarding the Ben Franklin: that is one of the few Stirling soaps that I just don't care for. The good thing, though, is that there are so many other terrific smelling Stirling soaps. For instance: Iced Pineapple!; Piacenza; Executive Man; Spice; British Leather; Peach, just to name a few.
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dangerousdon said:
Thanks for the description! I might be more confused now.
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Don, I thought I would circle back on this with a little more info on the Ben Franklin. I hope I don't muddy the water up too much. I think this scent could be a polarizing one and I would recommend a sample first. My nose sucks, due to smoking (don't hate) and bad sinuses. But I will try and describe it better.

The strongest note that I smell, in the tub, is like a menthol smell. But I don't think there is any type of menthol in it. I don't smell that when it lathers, it has more of a mellow spice kind of smell (maybe Frankincense, nutmeg or something). It doesn't have a menthol smell or feel during or post shave. Nothing else really jumps out.

On the AS, the first dominant note to my nose is Pine. I don't even know if it has Pine in it. That fades rather quickly and then mellows out to a spice scent. It's really kinda weird it starts with notes that I wouldn't buy a soap for, those fade quickly, and then to a mellow spice smell. And wraps up with a kind of root beer-ish kinda smell that is not sickly sweet.

I guess that's why I'm kinda on the fence about the scent. I don't hate it, but I don't absolutely have to have it either. It's different.
 


Started “free shave” weekend this morning with Maca Root soap again.

Pre Shave-

Warm water splash to shave.

Shave-
Gillette SS
Voskhod Blade
Razorock synth
Maca Root soap

Post Shave-
Warm water rinse

I kept the same blade and moved it to the SS. I loaded my brush for 15 seconds and got down to it. Once I started adding water the lather built up quickly. The scent is stronger in the tub but does dissipate while lathering. The lather was also slick, allowing for touch ups where needed.

I went with my standard three passes: WTG, XTG and ATG and have no drama to report. With this setup I walked away with a DFS shave. This blade seems like it will carry me through the weekend so I’ll hang on to it.

Post shave I followed up with a splash of water and a towel dry. I still don’t have any matching ASB with this one and that still felt kinda strange. It does deliver a great post shave feel and settles in quickly though. It leaves your face feeling soft and hydrated.

I ordered the ASB and it was delivered yesterday. Went to use it today, but they shipped me a face soap instead. Grrrrrrrrrr. Anyway, they replied today that they will get the correct product out ASAP. So there is that. Great shave though!
 
Nice shave Tim...tough break on the ASB/face soap, but it sounds like the vendor is making the fix.
 
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