Razor: DS Cosmetic DS-D8 w/ RazoRock Barberpole
Blade: Gillette Wilkinson Sword
Brush: Tournure de bois 26mm White Synthetic
Soap: OSP Business Time
Aftershave: OSP Business Time Splash
Other: Hugo Boss Bottled
I love a good dupe / homage so when Stonefield Shaving added a few OSP sets to their arsenal I was instantly intrigued. I hadn’t used OSP before and while most of the scents didn’t really appeal to me, Business Time definitely triggered a purchase response. The scent on business time is based on Hugo Boss Bottled. This frag was insanely popular in my younger days and I always intended to pull the trigger on a bottle and just never had the cash. Someday I knew I would pick this frag up and this matching set was just the excuse I needed to grab one.
First off, the annoyance, I’ve seen the scent notes on Business Time published incorrectly in multiple spots including direct from OSP. On paper, you wouldn’t think it was Boss Bottled. But I had it on good authority it was and so I pulled the trigger. I can confirm, it smells just like Boss Bottled. The published scent notes are 100% wrong (I’m fairly certain it was a copy and paste error from another frag and that problem has propagated down from artisan to vendors). It has that unmistakable apple pie vibe. Scent strength on the soap is about mid-strong and is bang on. Problem is, I’m not really a fan of the scent. I guess memory played tricks on me because when I received the actual frag and the set I was left with a bit of a letdown. Don’t get me wrong, it smells nice and the soap/splash and original EDT all smell the same, but it just isn’t a scent I’d care to wear very often. I can say if you are a Boss Bottled fan, you will really dig this scent on this set.
So how does it perform? Well, the ingredient list on this has me questioning a bit as well. This is a very hard soap base and reminds me a lot of the Purely Skinful Handmade Essentials base. It has that hard waxy feel to it. I 100% expected to see Soy Wax in the ingredient list but I don’t see that at all. Instead, you see a pretty standard dual lye Tallow soap base. I am dumbfounded it doesn’t have soy wax in the ingredient list and based on the error in the frag notes it makes me wonder if the ingredient list might be an old formulation list as well. Very strange. Not that it doesn’t perform like a shave soap, it very much does. This is a very thirsty, higher structure lather that is an average performer. It doesn’t hold up to the newest high-end bases but it does perform average or better on all metrics. Slick enough with an average post-shave. Not something I’d need to pick up more of, but would be willing to buy more if the scents matched something I wanted.
As for the splash (tonic), it isn’t anything special. It has a very thin, watery texture and has visible flecks in it. It carries the scent well but doesn’t really feel like it does much for me as a post-shave. Passable but certainly nothing to write home about. Again, I’m just not sure about the ingredient list here.
All in all, the OSP product line doesn’t do much for me. If the scent you want is available from another artisan I’d probably base shop but if they have a scent you want and are what is available, I don’t think you’d regret the purchase either. It does what it is supposed to do and all things considered, I still got a pretty damn good shave today. I can’t complain about that. All for now – J
