I shaved for the first time with a DE razor today. I have a Feather Popular, and I was using a Feather blade. I used Nivea shaving gel. I had no irritation, no razor burn, only one tiny nick, and no cuts.

I know that using canned gel is blasphemy in this subreddit, but, hey, if it works for me without giving me irritation, why switch? The shave was immaculately smooth and my face is BBS.

In the past, I used cheapo 2-4 blade razors with no shaving cream, just on a dry face. I was getting some irritation and I had to make a million passes to get anywhere, and I felt like shaving cream gummed up the cartridge razor, so I didn't use it. With a DE, the shaving cream only gets in the way after a lot of passes, and it gets off along with the hair with a quick pass under cold water.

Thanks for making this subreddit so I could find out about shaving implements other than cartridge razors. I also got a 25 blade sampler kit, and I plan on using them after my feather blades run out.