Silk Naturals Great Impressions Pressing Kit Review

Loose shadows are inexpensive, and very common among indie brands. Personally, I know that as lovely as my loose shadows are, they do not nearly get as much use as my pressed shadows. I have been researching options for pressing shadows for quite some time, and stumbled upon the NY-based indie brand, Silk Naturals. Silk Naturals sells a pressing kit that comes with 15 magnetic pans, a palette, two mixing spatulas, a container for the pans, and a 30 ml bottle of their Great Impressions gel- a pressing/mixing medium that contains "Ethanol, water, propanediol, carbomer."

After watching their company youtube video tutorial, I decided to go for it. 

I pressed 10 shadows. Unlike the video tutorial, I did not use pliers to press, because I feel like that would make the shadows too brittle and prone to breakage. It was easy enough to do, though I felt like I was eyeballing the amount of gel. For me, the whole process was a bit messy, and I wish I did it over newspaper. 

I'll organize the results by brand, and note the finish of the shadow. This is after leaving the pressed shadows to dry for 24 hours.

Shiro Cosmetics:

-Fleece-Lined Pillow Fort: A white satin. This was the first one I pressed. As this is my HG white shade, I was a little scared to press it. In the pan, I did not use enough product so the pan is about halfway filled. However, it seems to be holding its own and swatched beautifully. 

-Pietrisycamollaviadelrechiotemexity: A matte tan. There was not enough product to fill the pan and the end result is kind of crumbly. Swatches fine, though.

Meech and Mia: Both of these worked out beautifully. I am not going to write up separate comments for either shadow, because something about the ingredients of these powders reacted really well to the pressing medium. Both look gorgeous in the pan- high shine, and are holding together. They swatch smoothly and with intense pigment. 

-Purple

-Copper- **update. After two days, the top layer of the shadow in the pan crumbled. Maybe I was too rough with the palette? Most of the product is in there tightly packed, though, so I am not sure what happened.

Fyrinnae:

-Serendipity: Pressed excellently. Would still use Pixie Epoxy as a base, though, because it is a sheer shadow.

-Rapunzel Had Extensions: Reacted the best to the mixing medium. Swatches very opaque and still retained its duochrome quality. 

-Nepenthe: Not sure if I did not have enough product, or the ingredients in this one was slightly different, but pressing really did not do anything The shadow is pretty much still loose in the pan.

-Mythical Dalliance- This is a sheer glitter. Some of it has crumbled, but overall it is staying packed in the pan.

Silk Naturals:

-"Convertable" (free shadow w/ lip gloss). Useless. In 24 hours it turned back into a loose shadow in the pan.

Dose of Colors:

-Cone (shattered shadow from the Eyes Cream palette). Holding its own and swatches a little more sheer than it used to, but maybe that's because this press is more firm. But overall it is usable and pretty!

Overall, I didn't really have a set method for these, but I think shadows that were "drier" to begin with pressed the best. The ones that were looser and wetter to begin with did not react well.

Would I recommend this: Yes, just know there is a learning curve, and that drier formula loose shadows (ones that don't ball up because of a binding agent) will press more successfully!

Here are some pics and swatches:

This is the magnetic palette that accompanies the kit, as well as all the shadows I pressed. 

This is my super special awesome z-palette. I moved my favorite pressed ones here to get more use. The white shade is "Fleece Lined Pillow Forts," and then we have the two Meech and Mia shadows in the second row, starting from the left. They're the ones that look lumpy but shiny. Finally, the very last shadow, the last row far right is "Rapunzel Had Extensions."

A swatch of the four:

Shiny!

Have you ever tried pressing your own products? If so, how did it go?