Man’s search for the best shave is as old as shaving…

Shaving… Pull up a chair, gather round. Meet me here every Thursday and we’ll get into the, seemingly, never ending subject of shaving. Razor-Nuts (remember, this is a loving reference!) are almost as passionate as Knife-Nuts (I can hear many now saying they are MORE passionate… let the debate begin!)…

Wikipedia says (so it must be true) that the first copper razors began to appear around 3000 BC and they credit Egyptian priests and Alexander the Great as being among the first to promote the idea of an aesthetic approach to hygiene – in the case of Alexander it was also to lessen the ability of beard grabbing in battle! Regardless of the origins, it’s clear that man’s obsession with a good shave has been with us for a long time.

Before razors were invented, men wanting to remove facial hair did so by plucking with the edges of two shells (apparently this also predates the invention of the tweezers!). Modern wet shaving began with the advent of the straight razor - or shaving knife - which was developed in 18^th century Sheffield, England. In 1901 King Camp Gillette invented the first safety razor with disposable blades (a stroke of marketing genius as men had to come back for more blades – thus he also invented the retail “loss leader” but that’s another story). In the 1960’s the twin blade cartridge razor made its debut putting two blades together to go across the skin one after the other giving a closer, more comfortable shave…

(to be continued…)