Elevate Your Shave with the Perfect Shaving Brush

Most men apply shaving cream with their fingers and wonder why they still get razor burn.

A shave brush does 4 things your fingers can't. 

1. Lift. It lifts the hair away from the skin before the blade touches it — cutting at the base rather than at the surface. 
2. Penetrates Deeper. It works warm water and lather deep into the hair, softening it so the blade glides rather than drags. 
3. Exfoliates. It exfoliates, clearing dead skin cells that cause the blade to catch and skip. 
4. Create a Richer Lather.  It generates a richer, more protective lather than any can, tube, or fingertip application can produce.

When you use a brush to apply lather, the result is a shave that's closer, more comfortable, and noticeably easier on your skin — before the razor has made a single pass.

'Synthetic' Fiber vs. Badger Hair

We love a good super badger shave brush as much as the next guy.  They are gorgeous and clearly the gold standard in shaving brushes.  In fact, for years, that's all we stocked here at OneBlade - premium, super badger hair shave brushes. 

Badger hair retains water, builds lather and feels luxurious. That reputation isn't wrong — it's just incomplete.

What badger hair brushes don't tell you upfront: they smell. Not permanently, but until it's broken in, a new badger brush has a distinct wet-animal odor that takes time and repeated washing to fade. They also require a break-in period before the bristles soften and bloom to full lather capacity. And when they do shed — which they do — you'll find hairs in your lather.

The one area where badger still wins is heat retention — badger hair holds warm water slightly longer during the lather-building process. For most shavers, that difference is imperceptible once the lather is on your face.  Especially, if you're using the OneBlade LTHR machine.

Why We Now Prefer Synthetic

After years of only carrying badger brushes, we found that high-quality synthetic fibers have closed most of the performance gap. We have no been able to create a brush using synthetic fibers worthy of our Black Tie name.

Here's why you'll love the Black Tie Shave Brush from OneBlade:

1. Rich Lather with Less Product. Synthetic fibers hold enough water to build a dense, rich lather with less product than badger hair requires.
2. Still Firm, but Noticeably Softer. The bristles have a solid backbone that will exfoliate your skin but are softer at the tip, making them more ideal for sensitive skin.
3. More Hygienic.  Synthetic fibers dry substantially faster and typically, completely between uses.  This makes them more hygienic and definitely better smelling.
4. Longevity. They don't smell like a wet dog and they don't shed like a dog either. A synthetic fiber shave brush typically lasts 2 to 3 times longer than a comparable badger hair shave brush.
5. Cost. We make razors that sell for $300 or more so we believe in quality first. But with some badger brushes costing hundreds of dollars (simply because the badger hair is rare), it's nuts that you're paying more for a brush than a razor.  

For the same money you'd spend on a mid-grade badger brush, you can get a synthetic that performs identically, lasts longer, requires less maintenance, and even involves no animal sourcing. That's not a compromise. That's just the better option.  That's our Black Tie 20mm Knot Shave Brush.

Really, the only question is black or brown?