Essential Oils

A cool way to put some twist on the fragrance of your shaving lather or after shave splash is to use a little essential oil.

Essential oil is captured by distillation from the parent plant. Steam is passed through the plant material, distilled and voila! Essential oil.

EO’s are easy to come by at the drugstore or online. They are potent, so care needs to be used not to get it directly on your skin.

I like to mix up a little with unscented shave cream like Kiss My Face brand, or put some in a spritz bottle of witch hazel.

Glycerin soaps can be (carefully, slowly) melted, some EO stirred in and allowed to cool creating a custom-scented soap.

In my early days wet shaving I experimented a lot with this. I was going for a scent made popular by the Nancy Boy company: Lavender, peppermint, and rosemary. I’d melt a little Van Der Hagen soap and stir in some oil. I got a mix I liked but it took a few tries.

We have some hand soap around now, that’s really slippery and smells like chewing gum. Nothing I want to shave with, but it’s fine for hands. No need to waste perfectly good soap just because it’s got more peppermint scent than I anticipated.

Essential oils differ from fragrance oils in that fragrance oils contain some synthetics. I’m not sure whether they would do any harm mixed with soap; probably not.

Using your own essential oil, there is no limit to the possibilities of scent in your morning shave.