About Us

Hi there, my name is Matthew Levine. I am an ordinary guy who has been shaving for longer than I care to admit! 


I still remember my first time shaving as a little whipper snapper. I had no idea what I was doing and ended up cutting myself. It was embarrassing, and a little painful. But, my cut healed and I have slowly come to love the ritual of shaving. 


In recent years, I have had the privilege of going to barbershops and using shaving gear in quite a few parts of the world: from Toronto and Montreal to Geneva, Tokyo, and even Singapore.


Being a barber is a noble skill and I have a lot of respect for the guys who do this everyday. I am not claiming to be a barber, because I am not a barber, and in that sense I am not an expert. But, I am an ordinary guy who has slowly but surely gone from being terrible at shaving to pretty damn good. (I am so good at shaving and, more recently, cutting my own hair, that even my wife says I do a good job!)


On a more serious note, the COVID-19 pandemic has obviously changed all of our lives. If you had asked me a few months ago, I never would have thought I would spend an entire year unable to travel outside of Canada and unable to even work in an office (or go in to a grocery store without a mask on). 


Like many other guys, I really was not prepared for 'lock down' and I was not prepared for cutting my own hair. I found myself looking all over Google and YouTube to try to figure out how I could affordably take care of my hair while still looking and feeling good. To be honest, it was a bit nerve-wracking to feel like I had lost control of something so elemental. 


Well, one thing led to another and I ended up talking with a buddy about how he was keeping his hair under control. Turns out this guy is the son of a barber and he had a lot of good tips. One thing led to another and this blog was born. 


The mission of our little blog is simple: in a world of increased uncertainty and discomfort, we want to help our readers to solve their own problems. We are doing that by sharing the best information we have, and by the way a lot of that information is based on tradition and craftsmanship, which we respect and want to keep alive. 

This blog is published by a Canadian company that I have owned for several years, i.e. Castleview Solutions Incorporated. Castleview is a name that speaks to the experiences of my grandfather who went through infinitely more severe challenges  than I can dare imagine. My grandfather was a great man from whom I learned truly profound lessons about perseverance and resilience. Well before Corona, I had come to rely on those lessons and his memory.

 

The current moment in history is, as above, not an easy one but it does offer a precious opportunity for each of us to become better and stronger versions of our selves. If this blog serves some small part in your journey, I will be very pleased. 

  •  All the content you will find on this site has been planned and edited by me to ensure we meet strict quality standards. We do plan to use freelance writers in future to help but nothing is put online without a green light from me, the chief editor. This is to ensure all information we publish is accurate and you can trust it to make grooming and purchasing decisions. 
  • All in all, I want this site to be a place you can trust and that is not rigged by brand sponsorship so you can use our information to make the best decisions for yourself when it comes to shaving, trimming, cutting, and other kinds of 'male grooming' that we may explore in future.
  • As much as possible we try to get our hands on the items mentioned in this blog to get real-life experience with them but it is not always possible so we also rely on extensive online feedback from real customers of these items. It is not practical now, but we do intend to spend time in specialized stores to get to know new items as. they come out and identify those that may be of interest to you.

So why should you read Barberismo? I would say the main reason you would want to check us out is because you want to dramatically improve your at home shaving experience.

If you resonate with the following statements, you will enjoy the content you find on this site:

  • You want to step outside in the morning feeling fresh;
  • You want to look sharp for that big zoom meeting;
  • You want gear advice based on customer experience and not commercial sales pages; and
  • You care about barbershop craftsmanship and want your progeny to live in a world where we get our hair cut by people not robots.

If you are on board with this, I look forward to having you read our guides and tests. 



Sincerely

Matthew Levine

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