While on vacation recently, I busted the head on the Merkur 23c I'd settled on as my daily driver. While waiting on a replacement head, I decided to look into the idea of finding an economical version of something in nice, sturdy stainless steel. While doing that, I ran across a video from my favorite Youtuber (One Nick Shabazz) reviewing his favorite DE razor, the Feather AS-D2. As with most cravings of a capitalistic nature, this led my poor *** to checking in on the resale market for such a luxury item. After failing to find anything pretty much everywhere I looked, I decided to roll the dice and miraculously found one for sale on FB Marketplace, 15 minutes away...and listed for only $35. Not believing my luck, I jumped on this, made an even-more-lowball offer (because why not) and walked away with this razor and a huge stack of blades for $25 freaking dollars. Seems the older woman selling it was doing so because her Son had been unable to sell it in over a year (listed at the retail price) after not liking it after 2 shaves. He failed to communicate the actual price to his mother, she judged what it was worth on her own and as a result I now have a razor with tolerances tight enough to feel like jewelry rather than something you use to hack stubble off of my face every day. Frankly, I didn't really "get" the value of this razor until I had it in my hand and against my face. It looked so much like the dozen antique and modern razors I already had. But yes, there was definitely something there that felt tangibly different. The head is a perfected copy of an antique Gillette Tech made with modern materials, a CNC cutter and computer plotting the angles to maximize contact with the blade for maximum rigidity. For someone with extremely sensitive skin, this thing shaves like a breath of fresh of air. Providing a close shave which was also mild enough to actually avoid rather than just lessen my usual razor burn. So I asked myself, why didn't I get this thing years ago? And then I remembered the normal retail price. And I laughed. Cackled even. Like some ********* evil sorcerer from a Saturday morning cartoon.
Because I had finally won the game of shaving for the foreseeable future. So this is my shamelessly useless brag about my amazing luck along with my hopefully useful review of this razor's actual performance. Which I will sum up by saying that it's extremely mild while also being very effective at removing stubble. The shaving angle is also more intuitive than what I'm used to, making it very nimble in tight spaces like under my nose and around the corners of my mouth. Apart from that, there are also a few intangibles like the ergonomics of the handle, the finely balanced goldilocks heft of it and the thick matte chrome finish that make this feel like a luxury item. It is a tad shorter than the 23c but manages to feel long and stable enough in-hand that I don't need it to be any longer . That and the amazingly fine knurling make it feel like it's super glued to my fingers, even when soapy and wet.
Not sure there's anything more to say about the AS-D2. Surprisingly, it actually does provide a noticeable upgrade over everything I've shaved with up til now. Is it worth the actual retail price? For me...probably not. But at $25 I most certainly can't complain.
