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The 5th Annual Williams Mug Soap 3017 Challenge!

12. Tried my hand at bowl lathering again with backing down from a superload a bit. No sense in flogging the puck to waste soap. I did get a healthy amount of product due to the hot water bloom, but less than the near lather superload. It took a touch more work to raise the lather, but with minimal effort I got it pretty stable. I’m sure this is going to make me a better latherer when this is all over. At least my wrist will be fully loosened. The Gillette Platinum is smoothed out and feels like it’s good for a ton more shaves with no intervention.

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Day 18:

Progress regressing? Added too much water and the lather broke a bit, but it remained super slick. Puck looks like we’re still just getting started after 18 shaves.

The brush makes a huge difference. When I did this challenge in 2022 with a boar brush after 18 shaves the puck looked like this: IMG_3954.jpeg
 
#15 for me. On the road in a drier climate. I lost my lather a lot quicker than at home. Will need to spend some more time tomorrow on the lather.
 
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Shield stainless steel razor with titanium base plate.
Gillette Wilkinson Sword blade.
Razorock 400 Plissoft synthetic brush.
Williams Mug shave soap.
Timeless Razor shave bowl.
Scottish Antique by Andy Hilfiger cologne.

Shave 12 (yesterday) and 13 of if the Williams challenge.

For about the last four shaves of the Williams challenge I have started to load off if the puck and face lather. I'm getting a thicker and slicker lather.....you can teach an old dog new tricks.

Happy Humpday everyone!
 
13 scaled the load back a bit more to probe the lower limit of product and still get a good lather. I got so where it was heavy foam, but not really lather. Very slick, and reminiscent of what i’v3 seen guys get from other challenging soaps like Mitchell’s. Upon application from the bowl to the face the foam does dissipate some, but with some agitation it comes back. This is what I would characterize as a marginal lather. Still Williams slickness remains legendary and made for a perfectly great shave.
I was musing, while looking at my shave cabinet and estimating the number of blades contained therein. I estimate if I shave every day with only DE’s I won’t run out of blades until I’m about 103 years old or 38 years from now! And here I just ordered some more blades out of curiosity (Personna Gem PDG). I hope they don’t suck because it will be decades before I get to them! Lol

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Alsworth Drakkant Open Comb razor.
Gillette Wilkinson Sword blade.
Yaqi 24mm boar brush.
Williams Mug shaving soap.
Timeless Razor shave bowl.
Scottish Antique by Andy Hilfiger cologne.

Number 14 shave of the Williams challenge.

Take care everyone
 
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Spider said:
Similar. But I don’t think the same…. But I’ve never done a side by side comparison.
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Interesting. Plus I’d have to think that given the years the scent would have to change from what it might’ve smelled like when it was first bottled
 
EMG06 said:
Interesting. Plus I’d have to think that given the years the scent would have to change from what it might’ve smelled like when it was first bottled
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Nobody can answer that. Who knows what it smelled like originally?

Personally, I’d like to think that my NOS, perfectly preserved box, smells very close to what it did a hundred years ago, but there’s no way of knowing. But, what I can say, it that I have quite a few of the same vintage bottles and they all smell similar. The round bottle, that is discolored, does smell a little different, but the rest are very similar. I can only assume, that given a few different samples, of unknown but different providence, that all smell similar, are very similar to what they smelled like originally, time being the only common factor that may change that, as an unknown factor.
 
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