For Men, Luxury Regains Its Edge

"It would be good to do some more," he said. "It's part of the barber tradition."

The return of the shave is welcome to old-timers who feared that barbering's signature service -- the word barber refers to the beard, after all -- was going the way of fleams, leeches and other ancient tools of the trade.

"It's just getting bigger and bigger," said Charles Kirkpatrick, executive director of National Barber Boards of America, an association of state licensing groups. "Some states had talked about doing away with the shaving requirement [for certification]. But the shave is coming back in spas. They're selling 'em the works."

At the Grooming Lounge, a shave is as much about pageantry -- and high-end retail -- as personal hygiene. There is no red-and-white pole marking the storefront, and the well-appointed rooms of dark wood and black leather smell more of cappuccino than witch hazel. On a snowy evening recently, three men waited their turn, watching ESPN on a flat-screen television and sipping complimentary beverages. Coffee and soda are popular during the day, the hostess said, but beer and whiskey are the more likely choice of the many groomsman parties that come in for pre-wedding grooming.

The shave itself starts with hot towels from a steam caddy. The towels, wrapped around the face so only the nose is exposed, are followed by hot lather and moisturizer massaged brusquely into the skin. Only after three rounds of the towel-lather routine does Lubecki or one of the other shavers apply the blade.

Or rather, blades. The Grooming Lounge, like the Michael Craig Salon on Capitol Hill, has sacrificed the menacing romance of the straightedge for the modern multi-bladed safety razor. Lubecki's is a Gillette Mach III with a deluxe metal handle. Still, they swear that the heat, the oil and two passes with the Gillette (one with the grain, one against) produce a shave every bit as close as a straight edge.

"It gives you about an extra day" between shaves, Lubecki said, as he pulled the finishing towel from a bucket of ice water. "You'll wake up tomorrow and it will still feel like you just shaved yourself."

Like many clients, Larry Leadman of Silver Spring went to the shop because his wife gave him a gift certificate for a shave and a massage.

"The shave was awesome, and I immediately got suckered into buying some of their special shaving cream," Leadman said. "It's not something I could afford to do every week, but I'll be back."

More affordable hot shaves are available at a few barbershops in the area. Spiro Hallas, 80, said he does four or five a week at his shop in Bethesda. Most of those are done for elderly men too infirm to shave themselves.

"Their wives bring them," he said.

One of his younger customers, T.K. Maloy, 47, of Cabin John, was getting one of Hallas's $15 shaves one afternoon last week.

"It's always been a weakness of mine. It's just really relaxing," said Maloy as Hallas finished up the close work below an ear. "Of course, you have no choice but to relax when someone is wielding a sharp knife near your face."