Product Review: Physicians Formula Organic Wear 100% Natural Origin Pressed Powder

Is it me or do these makeup names get very lengthy?  :-P  Please read the official description for the product from the Physicians Formula website here.  

This pressed powder claims that it is 100% free of harsh chemicals, synthetic preservatives, parabens, GMO's (???), synthetic colors, fragrances, and it is 100% cruelty free.  HOWEVER, there is a disclaimer that Physicians Formula has multiple suppliers for this powder, so there may be variations in the ingredients!!!!

That said, let's get on to my opinion of this product.

First of all, I bought this product last year to top over my MAC foundation.  I used this to replace the MAC pressed powder I had.  This is all psychological but I love the natural theme that's going on with the cardboard and paper compact.  The ingredients on my box didn't have a lot of chemical-like words, but then again what do I know about chemicals.  A rose by any other name is still a rose, right?  It snaps shut with magnets and is very convenient in terms of traveling or taking with you on your normal work day.  It comes with a mirror on the other side of the compact and a goat hair brush.  It is a little bit bulky, but I think that your feelings on bulky vs. non-bulky really depend on the person or the person's mood at the time.

The goat hair brush is very stiff and scratched at my face.  So after about a week of using this product with the included brush, I threw away the goat hair brush.  The only good thing about the goat hair brush is that it was small enough to fit in the compact in the space over the mirror.  I found it better when I used my own brush to apply this powder, even if they were too big to fit it the compartment over the mirror.  But that is an easy fix.  You can buy powder puffs at the drugstore and those would fit in the compartment over the mirror as well.

The product itself is pressed loosely so when you apply a brush (coarse or fine haired brush), the pressed powder crumbles easily and leaves behind a lot of powder dust.  I felt that the looseness of powder is a waste of money because for the price I paid I did want to get every last particle.

In terms of shine protection this product is great!  It doesn't mattify my face for the entire day, but then again I don't really expect any powder or product to control the amount of oil my skin can produce (did I mention that paper towels are also considered face blotters in my world?).  But when I do touch up during the day, this powder is amazing at the instant matte effect.  It goes on without making my face look very powdered. 

In terms of coverage this is a very light coverage.  I wouldn't say it's sheer, but it's not medium coverage either.  On a sliding scale, this is somewhere between sheer and light coverage, so it works very well if you have a foundation base.  I like the idea of even skin tone and I want even an even skin tone, but truthfully the only foundation I had until a few weeks ago was the MAC foundation and that really slipped around on my face after a few hours.  So for coverage purposes, this Physicians Formula product did not cut it for me.  However, for mattifying, this is one of the best products I can think of.  It doesn't last a very long time (I'd say 3-4 hours tops), but I don't really mind the extra work.

The different shades in each compact really appeals to my sense of versatility.  When I wore this with MAC foundation, I could swirl both colors together an all over face powder, use only the light colors under my eyes or to highlight the higher features of my face (don't be fooled, this is NOT a highlighter, I just thought it would help a little), and use the darker shade to contour.  As a contour shade, the darker colors have some light pigmentation that does do the job of faking that slight shadow.  It's not going to do the work of a real contour powder or bronzer but this compact can provide a small degree of 3-dimensionality to your face.  

As for my feeling on this powder and if I would buy it again, I probably would.  I don't have anything bad to say about this pressed powder but at the same time, this isn't exactly a favorite powder or anything.  I think I feel this way because it is a very functional powder for me and it's mid-range in price for drugstore products.  So the best way I can describe my feeling on it if I had to do it through suggestions is: 

It's a good product to recommend to people who are starting out or who want to experiment with different pressed powders but if they find a favorite product that is not the Physicians Formula Organic Wear 100% Natural Origin Pressed Powder, then there is definitely no hard feeling.  

^_^