Venetian is regarded the best shoe conditioner in the world among Americans. While the rest of the world may agree Saphir Renovateur is better. Venetian has an unmatched advantage to Saphir which is tannery Horween officially appoints Venetian Imperial Leather Balm to care its most sought after shell cordovan.
On the other hand, in the introduction from Venetian, nothing is mentioned that this conditioner was developed for shell cordovan, nor Horween shell cordovan. In fact, this product does not have any introduction online, not even the official website. The only online presence of this product is in its parent company, C.A.Zoes website, and that site makes your time travel back to 1980s.
I put my hands on Venetian Imperial to care my Carmina 910 made of Horween shell cordovan, colour 8. Note the product name of Venetian is also colour 8. What a coincidence.
I wore it in a super big shower, and very severe water stains on the upper. I used RenoMat to remove the water stains, it was successful, however the sheen of shell cordovan was ruined as well.
At the heel side, several scratches are obvious. My shoes all have wears here and I don’t know how it happens.
Enter the product, Venetian Imperial Leather Balm, colour 8.
Its viscosity is quite dense but I don’t feel the wax content is high.
Smoothen it over, and the surface looks much even and well coloured.
I put one layer on these scratches, the effect is not very good. But with more layers, the coverage was good.
The left was cared and right not. Left pair was significantly darker and more even than right pair.
Conclusion
To keep the colour of shell cordovan shoes even, Venetian Imperial Leather Balm did a good job, but to bring back the sheen, it is not so pronounced.