The Segal razor is a nifty piece of engineering, it is a twist-to-open razor, but not in the sense that it has doors that open, instead the entire cap pushes upwards and twists/rotates to provide access for the user to slip the blade over the 'open end' of the cap, place the blade on the base and then rotate the knob in the opposite direction to close up again. a Very cool razor indeed. The Segal company was well known for making locks, so keeping this in mind one could understand the type of action and design employed in the opening and closing of this razor. They sold the razor for a few years in the early 1930's, but the razor never really took off, whether it was lack of advertising, being pushed out by big boy Gillette, overpriced products, or simply a crappy shave compared to other razors/blades at the time can only be speculated over, but they are certainly collectable and a cool 90 year old razor to own!
I have manged a fairly good shave by simply pressing a normal blade over the cap en forcing it over (as it is quite flexible) but a modified blade works much better in this razor, so take a bit of time over the weekend and pre-cut yourself a few in your spare time, modifications to blades is not something you'd want to do when in a rush to get to work!
The vintage blades are not great, but then again, why not use one and appreciate the luxury we have with modern stainless steel blades that are coated, use the vintage blades a template to to modify your favorite 'modern blade' rather then using them to shave with. Here is a nice article on how to modify a regular double edged blade
We have a few packs of new vintage blades more available on our store, but modifying readily available blades would be the best way to go for good shaves.
a Great piece for the collector or someone wanting something out of the ordinary. The razor has a pretty solid feel to it and weighs 70 grams, with a height of 85 mm,