This article is a part of ShoeTree Project’s special How-to-use Series, a comprehensive series of structured guides that help budding shoe owners use their shoe care products properly and efficiently – check the rest out!
As the name suggests, the main function of shoe polishes is to make shoes look good. There are 2 broad categories of shoe polishes: cream polishes and wax polishes.
Cream polishes restore colour vibrancy to your shoes. Without the natural repair mechanisms it enjoyed when still part of a live animal, an organic material like leather is bound to degrade over time (though many times slower if cared for properly). Microscopic flakes fall of the surface of your leather shoes all the time, and even though you can’t see these flakes, the effect will become more visible over time as the dyed surface of your shoes flakes off and your shoes look tired and faded. If you are shelling out a few hundred or more on quality leather shoes, you’ll want them to look like they’re worth at least as much!
A good cream polish like the Saphir Pommadier is very, very pigment rich and looks opaque even when you pick up a small amount (unlike wax, which is slightly translucent). These pigments form a thin layer over your shoe so that colour looks even throughout, giving the shoe that new and ‘fresh’ look! In addition, the Saphir Pommadier uses natural Shea Butter as its cream base, which provides additional nourishment to shoe leather as a bonus side effect.
How to use the Saphir Pommadier
- Remove your shoelaces and clean your shoe with a horsehair brush.
- Pick up some polish with a horsehair dauber brush. A dauber brush prevents your hands from getting stained by the pigment-rich cream polish, which can be hard to get off. It is very important to use separate dauber brushes for each colour of polish. Sharing a common brush between black and brown polishes, for example, will cause black streaks to appear on your brown shoes.
- Using quick circles, spread the Saphir Pommadier over your shoe leather quickly, using the bristles to work the polish into corners and welts. Spread this evenly, picking up more polish as required until the entire shoe is covered.
- Let the polish sit on the shoe for a few hours. It should form a matte layer over the leather as it dries.
- Brush the shoe with broad quick strokes using a horsehair buffing brush to get rid of this matte layer and bring a refined sheen to your shoes. This buffing slightly heats up the minute amount of wax in the Saphir Pommadier, allowing you to smoothen it and form a slight shine.
- If there are any particularly faded areas that need additional recolouring, you can add more Saphir Pommadier to that area after the previous application of cream polish dries.
FAQs about the Saphir Pommadier
How often should I use the Saphir Pommadier?
You should use the Saphir Pommadier as you see fit (when your shoes don’t look as new anymore). This varies on the quality of leather used in the shoes and how you wear them, but is about 1-2x a month on average.
How much Saphir Pommadier should I use each time?
Instead of using a predetermined amount of cream polish, you should strive to restore the colour of your shoes. Usually, 1 or 2 even applications around the entire shoe is enough. If there are certain scuff marks or faded areas that require extra attention, you can apply more polish to these areas until they blend into the rest of the shoe.
No colour of Saphir Pommadier matches my shoes exactly, what should I do?
It is a common misconception that the leather and cream polish colour has to match exactly. This is untrue for a few reasons:
- Unlike a leather dye (which bonds to leather and permanently alters its colour), cream polish pigments lie on top of the surface of the leather in a thin layer and “adds” to the existing colour rather than changing it.
- As long as you apply the polish over your shoe evenly, the entire shoe will look the same so slight changes in colour are impossible to notice. In fact, the colour of leather also naturally changes as it is slowly oxidized by air and sun! If in doubt, choose a lighter rather than darker shade of cream polish to minimize any change in colour.
- Any changes from cream polish can be easily reversed with a leather stripper like Saphir Reno’mat, which dissolves all polish layers on top of the leather for an easy wipe.
What if I do not like the effect of the cream polish I applied?
If you’d accidentally misjudged the colour, or dripped polish of a wrong colour onto your precious leather shoes, it can be removed easily with a leather stripper like Saphir Reno’mat, which dissolves all polish layers on top of the leather for an easy wipe.
Can I use a neutral cream polish for different pairs of shoes with different colours?
Neutral cream polish is usually used as a polish base for very light coloured shoes e.g yellow, beach, white etc. Because it doesn’t have any pigments, it will not help restore colour to dark coloured shoes.
Need a cream polish to keep your leather shoes in great shape? Buy the Saphir Pommadier Cream Shoe Polish with FREE Shipping from ShoeTree Project!
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Next: How to use the Saphir Pate de Luxe Wax Polish
