Antique Barber Shaving Bowl French Faience Floral Yellow Flowers Ceramic. Small chips as these were utilitarian primarily and decorative secondary. A barber’s bowl was once an essential tool for a barber shaving his customers. It has a shallow basin with a broad rim. A semicircular opening in the rim allows it to fit closely against the neck of the person being shaved, permitting his chin to reach over the bowl. Two holes in the top of the rim were fitted with string so the bowl could be hung on the wall, and its decoration admired, when not in use. Philadelphia Museum of Art.