My husband and I love the BBC programme The Repair Shop. He’s particularly interested in it because he does a lot of woodwork and other crafting in his workshop – but I’ve picked up some tips and ideas too, which I ended up applying to a Christmas present this year.
In early October, we went on a little adventure to Cornwall – Nicholas was keen to go to an antiques market he had seen advertised in the hope of picking up some tools, and I was on the prowl for Christmas presents. So we hopped on a train, crossed the Tamar, and had a day out in Truro.
At the antiques market, Nicholas successfully located some tools for a bargain price – jackpot! I was perusing the same stall while he agreed a good deal with the seller, and I came across an old red leather Radio Times cover. My mum and I both get RT, so I picked it up for a few pounds, thinking it might make a good present.
When I looked at it at home, I re-considered. It had lost a fair amount of its gold detail, and the central picture was a bit beaten up. I may still do my best to renovate it for my own use.
But I really liked the idea, so I took to eBay to find an alternative. When it arrived, I was pleased with the decoration and the deep burgundy colour, but I thought I could definitely scrub it up a bit.
I’d seen enough Repair Shop to know not to go rushing into this. I did my research first, and looked up how to clean leather. The first thing I needed to find out was whether this was real leather or faux leather. I thus encountered the water droplet test: if a drop of water is absorbed then it is real leather (because it seeps into the pores); if it stays on the surface it is faux leather. I did my experiment, and discovered that this was faux leather.
Once more taking inspiration from The Repair Shop, I used a cotton bud to test out the various cleaning methods I came across online. At first I tried just water. This took some dirt off – but the going was incredibly slow. Then I tried a gentle washing-up liquid mixture: much more successful, but still slow. My final experiment was with white vinegar, but this didn’t seem to do any more than the washing-up liquid. So I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed with soapy water and a sponge, making sure I went into all the grooves. It was surprisingly hard work (my arms ached afterwards!), but certainly rewarding:
It came up so shiny! I was delighted! It also felt a lot better – soft and flexible rather than tacky and stiff.
The other thing I decided to do was to replace the inner string. I thought it would be nice to freshen the cover up as much as possible, and I had some red glittery thread that I thought would do the trick.
All in all, a satisfying little project which made a well-received gift!
Cryptic Meg 