A leather padfolio is a perfect way to keep your professional documents and essentials organized way so that you’re ready to face any meeting or task.
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The leather makes them look not only professional but highly appealing in an elegant and sophisticated way. Not to mention that leather is incredibly durable, and you certainly need to be able to outlast those job meetings!
However, with time and use, leather can end up cracking, giving it a worn-out appearance. Less than ideal. You might feel like you have to throw it away and buy another, but the truth is, you can restore the cracked leather yourself so that it looks good again and you can keep on using it.
The idea of restoring the cracked padfolio might be a little daunting, but we’ve covered all of the basics with a detailed step-by-step guide, so you know exactly what to do. Let’s get right into it!
Contents
Why does leather crack?
Before we jump right into the process of restoring your cracked leather padfolio, let’s talk about why it has cracked in the first place. If leather is so durable, what has caused it to look so worn?
Leather is a natural material, made from animal skin, and therefore it can dry out over time. When it does dry out, it causes the surface to crack, giving it the worn-out appearance. You can think of it in the same way as how your skin can dry out when it’s not properly moisturized. Usually, leather padfolios will be suitably moisturized and imbued with lubricating oils and waxes, that protect them from becoming dry and cracking.
However, if your padfolio is exposed to a drastic change of temperature, or it has simply been used regularly for a long time, these will wear off and it will lose its protection.
So quite simply, although leather is very durable, it will begin to crack in time, if you use it regularly or it is exposed to the elements. You can avoid this by using precautions and maintenance on the leather, but we’ll look at that later on.
Restoring a Cracked Leather Padfolio
The thing with cracks in leather is that they’re pretty much permanent. But that doesn’t mean you can’t restore the padfolio to look good again!
It just means that the process of restoring the leather is all about hiding the cracks in the best way possible, and about strengthening the leather so the cracks don’t get any worse. So the cracks will still be there, but the leather will no longer look as worn.
Let’s look at two methods of restoration, depending on whether the cracks are light, or deep.
Restoring Light Leather Cracks
Light cracks are pretty easy to smooth out, and they can be blended in with the rest of the leather by strengthening the fibers around them.
Here is how to do it:
- First you need to clean the leather, until it’s soft again. To do this, you can use a bit of mild soap, and apply it with the use of a soft cloth, or a soft bristled brush. Cleaning the leather will get rid of any dirt trapped in the cracks, and it will soften it up so it’s more flexible to work with and restore.
- Next, you will need to use a leather cream conditioner. This is the key to restoring the cracks. This will hydrate the leather, strengthen the fibers, and will smooth out the cracks so that they’re a lot less visible. To apply the conditioner, you can use a sponge, a cloth, or even your finger. Simply keep applying the conditioner, smoothing it in, until the cracks begin to look restored.
- Once you’ve applied enough conditioner, leave the leather padfolio to dry out naturally. This way it can finish absorbing all of the conditioner.
- With light cracks, this should perfectly restore the leather. If not, apply another few layers of conditioner and try again!
Restoring Deeper Leather Cracks
If your leather padfolio has deeper cracks, smoothing them out with a conditioner is unlikely to do the trick, as it won’t be able to smooth them out enough to stop being visible.
Instead, you will have to fill the cracks up, with leather crack filler, so that they completely disappear. Here’s how to do it:
- First of all, you need to clean the leather, to get rid of any dirt trapped in the cracks. Do this by mixing mild soap with water, and then applying it to the leather with the help of a sponge or soft cloth.
- Next, you need to leave the leather to dry out completely, preferably overnight. This is because any left over moisture will prevent the crack filler from settling.
- The following day, use some fine sandpaper to smooth out the cracks, then wipe away the dust.
- Now it’s time to apply the leather crack filler. Apply it onto the leather, and then spread it to cover all the cracks with the help of a palette knife or brush. When the cracks are completely full, scrape off the leftover filler so the surface is smooth.
- Let the leather dry out for around 6 hours. Keep it away from direct sunlight and heat as it does so.
- Check the cracks! As the filler solidifies, it sometimes shrinks. If that is the case, add some extra filler and repeat the process until the cracks have been completely smoothed out and are gone!
Preventing Cracks in a Leather Padfolio
Once your leather padfolio has been fixed up, how can you prevent it from cracking again? It’s quite simple, you have to avoid it drying out.
The best way to do this is by applying soome leather conditioner every now and then, to ensure it is well hydrated.
You can also keep it away from direct sunlight and heat, as those will dry it out a lot faster.
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In Conclusion
To sum it all up, restoring a cracked leather padfolio is possible, whether it has light cracks or deeper cracks. The way to restore it is by either strengthening the fibers and smoothing out the cracks (with the use of leather conditioner), or filling up the cracks so that the surface is smoothed out (with the use of leather crack filler).
Leather cracks when it becomes dry, so to prevent it from happening again you can ensure it stays well hydrated by regularly applying leather conditioner, and by keeping it out of dry and hot weather!