Just realized the barber shop in the old mall in Springfield still uses a straight razor for every neckline.

I was getting a trim there last week and watched the owner, who must be in his 70s, do a perfect clean-up on the guy in the next chair without a single guard or trimmer, just a steady hand and a leather strop he keeps on the counter.

2 comments

2 Comments

olivias881mo ago

Yeah but is this really that deep? A guy using a straight razor isn't exactly some lost art, barbers have been doing it forever. I'd be more worried if he was using a rusty one from the 80s.

the_nathan1mo ago

You'd be more worried if he was using a rusty one from the 80s" - see that's the thing though. That kind of thinking is exactly why people don't realize how sketchy it actually is. A straight razor from the 80s that's been properly maintained? That's actually safer than some cheap modern one from a mystery brand on Amazon. The real problem isn't the age of the tool, it's whether the person using it knows what they're doing with it. Like I've seen barbers with brand new equipment slice people up because they learned from YouTube instead of an actual mentor. So no, it's not that deep in terms of some lost art thing, but it is deep in the sense that the skill gap is way wider than people think.