Thiers Issard 275 100 Le Chatellerault French Straight Razor | Carbon Steel (Historic HOLTZER 20th C. Forgings) | 6/8 Size | Extra Full Hollow Ground | Round Point | Bocote Wood Handle | Made in France

Description

Handmade in France

Made by hand, uniquely, “TIs” are the most hollow and flexible razors in the world still made.

Thiers-Issard has produced straight razors for nearly 100 years in Thiers, France, in the traditional methods unique to this most special of nations.

The “Le Chatellerault” is an extra full ground special razor, because the molten steel used was forged in the early 20th century for Jacob HOLTZER; the steel was forged then, and thereafter tempered/ground/polished/laser engraved/sharpened/scaled by the Thiers-Issard of today.  Likely in pockets of cutlery of the EU there are more still opportunities for historic forgings, so it is sort of like buying “whisky with a story”, as I like to call it – this steel is not the Carbonsong C135 of TI’s own creation as on almost every other razor they make.  Not quite the same as any other modern forged TI, and so whether that is a good or bad thing is for you to decide, but a collector should have one, I suspect.

The razor comes with their basic black lambskin pouch, scales made from bocote wood (with 100% of the labor done by Thiers themselves in-house, to an exceptional standard), and weighs ~fifty grams.

There is *not* a secondary ridge at the heel of the blade; this “shoulderless” razor’s got a conventional tang with nice file jimps on the underside and a *forged* “Guyonneau Chatellerault” mark, which, too, may indeed have been done long long ago.  Matter of fact I’d wager good money that only the sourced steel and its forging happened decades ago, and all the other work of the razor, from the heat treatment and tempering processes to the stamping and laser-engraving to the hollow grinding to polishing to the sharpening and honing and to the fitting to scales, was all done today.  Quite often when a long span of decades passed between forging and heat treat, the razor will exhibit funny marks that sort of look like oxidation or pitting, but cannot be polished away.  Often, but not always; some old forgings do that, and some do not.  Funny thing, among these “new old forgings” class of today’s razors, the very best razor I have ever used as such had those whatever they are pittings in the steel.  They’re not present here, but you can still be sure the forging is at least two decades old, conservatively.

It is not the equal of 6/8″ to the modern Evide Sonnant Extra in the quoted-vs-actual-width, though the ’round’ head used here does in fact look just like the modern ESEs, with the rather crisp terminus.

 “Shave Ready”?

This business is wholly centered upon the sale of one hollow ground straight razor to one shaver one at a time; “1 str8rzr alone” is ~50% of all our orders.    You may elect to have your Thiers-Issard with its factory edge (which we think is exceptional, but that’s just one subjective opinion, and opinions vary) or further honed by ‘TSS’, as only you see fit; there is not a right or wrong answer.    ‘TSS’ rather doubts the worth of debating this ‘Shave Ready’ concept today;  anyone can bandy that term about as if objective, meaningful information (like a sprinter’s time), but in fact it is completely subjective.

If you elect for the factory edge [= just pick your ‘specimen’ from the ‘police lineup’ images, nothing more], you’ll receive your razor exactly as its manufacturers intended…pretty simple!

If you elect for The Superior Shave to further hone your razor [= after selecting your ‘specimen’ from the ‘police lineup’ images, add a ‘note to vendor’ during your checkout process to let us know you’d like the razor further honed], this TI shall be honed in the manner taught in 2016 to The Superior Shave’s proprietor by two kind Solingen master grinders (whom did/do not work for Dovo, but do use similar 1840s grinders’ textbooks methods).    Regardless of their poor refinement  compared to further-honed ‘Honemeister’ edges on offer,  some physical elements of factory edges remain superior to most further honing attempts.   The Superior Shave will devote the extra time to your razor a dying industry cannot afford in overhead, without taking away the factory edge’s inherently advantaged geometric metrics.     We’re confident we offer the materially thinnest  further-honed-by-vendor edge available for purchase – you’ll need to try that to understand why it matters.     Please note: in the professional opinions of German and French razor grinders, a straight razor is not properly honed unless flush to the hone, without tape, so visual evidence of honing is unavoidable when honing is performed correctly according to its makers.

We hone with a method best coined as “the opposite of tape“ where a hone’s geometry’s wholly catered to performance of the razor and to no other concern.  Unfortunately, this topic cannot be discussed upon any English-based straight-razor-centric forum because a select group of e-enthusiasts cannot  abide such open discourse.     Be encouraged to think for yourself, and let your beard and sense of touch be the judge; there is a lot of misinformation out there, much purportedly from experts!     We wish you good shopping, and Happy Shaving.