Metallic Pantone inks are only available in litho / offset presses. Monaco Print are the only printer in the whole of Monaco who have multi color litho / offset presses. So we can print your colour goods and also the Pantone metallics. Good to know before you start.
Now back to why and when to use. Our personal preference is to use them on coloured stock. So paper that is already coloured. Like the example in this post. We’ve used a lovely dark blue paper as the base and then we’ve printed in various gradients and opacities of gold Pantone ink. Normal ink would hardly be visible but the metallics sit on top of the paper and have small flecks of reflective material in them to give a glittery sheen.
Another instance where Pantone Metallics are favorable is when a you want a gold or silver foil block effect but you don’t want the high gloss / mirror finish. The Pantone metallics look very similar to foil blocking but the results are much more matt and in our opinion ‘modern’ in comparison to the uber shiny typical gold foils.