Diffusers are one of their famous products. Its scent lasts longer than other products which are sold outside of school. Photo provided by Egong-gong.

Would you believe that you can get your diffuser, mist, lip balm, and other cosmetics that are made at Ewha’s engineering laboratory? These engineering students, also known as Egong-gong, make their own natural cosmetic products in the university lab. 
“We would like to say it’s our own natural cosmetics workshop,” said Kang Seo-hee and Hong Hae-ji, both members of the club and juniors in the Division of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science.
Egong-gong, founded in 2017, is Ewha’s natural cosmetic manufacturing club, which is funded by Center for Innovation in Engineering Education. The club started as a team project for an engineering major course, where they had to design fine dust block products. While working on the project, Son Jin-a, the current president of Egong-gong, came to think of making more makeup products, including fine dust block products, and aiming to gradually expand the categories of cosmetics that could be manufactured beyond their team project.
“I came across the idea because I thought it would be great to have a club where members deal with the whole manufacturing process with their own hands,” Son said.
There are currently 13 students in the club, all studying in the Division of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science and Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering. Most of the students have experience in making cosmetic products, and many are also interested in working at cosmetics manufacturing industry.
Egong-gong manufactures various natural cosmetic products including rose argan mists, diffusers, and mint lip balms. They highly value the natural aspect of cosmetics because they are aware of the dangers of chemical products, often hazardous to the environment. The members always use their own beakers to prevent accidents that may occur when the chemical residues left by previous experiments react with their cosmetics ingredients.
Kang and Hong shared that making these kinds of cosmetic products is the best part of Egong-gong, alongside selling and designing. 
“At first, we were amazed by the fact that manufacturing cosmetics is not that hard; products that we use in our daily lives are quite easy to make,” they said. “Making cosmetics based on the ingredients that I get to choose was also thrilling.”
Egong-gong can be seen in one of the booths during the school festivals. They sold their handmade cosmetics at their booth during the Daedong Festival in May. The club also sold their products at the Meondong festival, a festival for students in the ELTEC College of Engineering. Egong-gong was especially grateful to the students who have shown interest towards their products.
“We were really worried about our booth. Daedong Festival is mainly about food stalls, so we did not think many students would come,” they said. “But so many positive comments about our products were posted on the online school community board, and our products were quickly sold out, much to our surprise.”
Egong-gong aims to broaden the opportunity to make a variety of cosmetic lines depending on specific skin types and ages. The club also wishes to sell their own products at flea markets outside of school soon.

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