Category — Blades

Columnist Jeff Jardine of the Modesto Bee is considering giving up shaving rather than pay Gillette prices for blade cartridges.

Maybe there’s another way, Jeff…

Method Shaving is an alternative style of wetshaving conceived by Charles Roberts, an entrepreneur who hails from Austin, TX.

The Roberts Method relies on the use of products designed by Mr. Roberts and available through his shop, Enchante. The products stress natural ingredients minimizing the use of chemicals. All Method products are meant to keep the maximum amount of water on the face and beard, saturating the whiskers to their utmost potential.

Strict ‘forms’ of whisker cutting are observed, making Method Shaving almost a martial art in execution.

While devotees of Method Shaving are few, they are loyal and their numbers are growing.

I’m not going to pretend to be an expert on the Method, as I haven’t tried it. I do want to add information about Method Shaving to the Wet Shavers Blog for the record, and give you a handy jumping-off point to find out more about it.

Here’s a list of links to sources of details on the Roberts Method. First off is of course a video by Roberts’ fellow Texan, Mantic.

Mantic’s Concepts of Method Shaving Part One

Hydrolast products forum

Method shaving board at The Shave Den forum

Enchante shop online

It might come as news to some that Mother Earth News, the venerable guide to green lifestyles, reprints old articles from the magazine on their Web site. It did to me.

Here’s an article from 1972 on how to shave with a straight (cutthroat) razor. The advice is as sound today as it was back then. Or in 1872, for that matter.