Hide · Full grain, vegetable tanned
Leather
The tanning decides the life, the layer decides the strength, and the word genuine on a label is a warning rather than a promise.
Tanning, which decides the character
Vegetable tanning uses tannins from bark and takes weeks. It produces a firm, dense leather that holds a shape, darkens with light and oils, and develops the patina that people mean when they talk about leather ageing well. It is what a good belt, a saddle and a structured bag are made of.
Chrome tanning uses chromium salts and takes a day. It produces a softer, more flexible, more water resistant leather that takes colour brilliantly and does not develop a patina in the same way. It is the majority of the world production and it is the correct choice for a soft jacket or a lining. Neither is better. They are different materials with different jobs, and a vegetable tanned bag that has been asked to be soft will simply be a stiff bag.
Reading a bag or a shoe
Look at the cut edge. Full grain leather shows a dense fibre structure that is uniform through the thickness. A bonded or heavily coated leather shows a distinct coating layer over a fibrous mat, and that boundary is where it will eventually separate. Edges that are painted rather than burnished are hiding something, or are simply faster to produce, and both are worth knowing.
Then look at the grain itself. Real full grain has irregularity: pores of varying size, the occasional scar, a grain pattern that does not repeat. An embossed finish repeats, because it came off a plate, and once you have seen the repeat you cannot stop seeing it.
The shoe question
A Goodyear welted shoe has the upper stitched to a welt, which is stitched to the sole, which means the sole can be replaced several times without disturbing the upper. A cemented shoe has the sole glued, which is lighter, cheaper and effectively unrepairable. Across a decade the welted shoe at three times the price is usually the cheaper object, and it is also the only one that shapes itself to a foot permanently.
The layers, best to worst
A hide is split into layers. The name on the label tells you which one you have.
How to check it
- Smell it. Real leather smells of leather. Coated and bonded material smells faintly of plastic and solvent.
- Press the surface with a thumb. Full grain wrinkles finely around the pressure point. A coated split stays flat or creases in a straight line.
- Look for the cut edges, inside a pocket or under a strap. A coating layer visible at the edge is a coating that will peel.
- Check the stitching density. Eight to ten stitches per inch on a bag, tight and even, with no skipped or doubled stitches at the corners.
Care
- Condition twice a year with a cream matched to the tannage. Vegetable tanned wants wax and oil, chrome tanned wants a lighter cream.
- Never dry near a radiator. Heat drives out the fats and the leather goes brittle and cracks along the flex lines.
- Wet leather dries slowly, at room temperature, stuffed with paper to hold its shape.
- Rotate shoes so each pair rests a day. Twenty four hours of drying doubles the life of a shoe, which is not an exaggeration.
- Cedar shoe trees, inserted warm, absorb moisture and hold the shape. This is the one job cedar genuinely does well.