Why did you ever buy another jacket after this one? It set a bar too high.Leather jacket makers aren't necessarily tanning experts and often enough, when a leather jacket maker is introducing a new leather, they too go through the same process of trial and error, trying to find that perfect leather to work with.
If the leather seemed good and came from a somewhat respectable tannery, in all likelihood, Lewis Leathers too could not have anticipated something like this would happen so what happened to you might turn out to be as much of a shock to them as it was to you.
Which is why I'm absolutely sure they'll take care of you. LL isn't some small time cheapo scam company. Hearing about it will probably upset them even more than it did you.
The jacket that you bought is a motorcycle jacket at its core. Regardless of how it was stored, believe me when I say that this should not have happened. No way. 7 years ago I have found a motorcycle leather jacket that was buried for years under a pile of boards in an old, leaking attic. I dusted it off, cleaned it and wore it for a year. Eventually I gave it to a friend who to this day wears it on an almost daily basis and other than the usual light fading, not a single stitch on that jacket is out of place.
My Lewis Leathers Super Phantom was sitting piled up in a corner of an old, musty, stinking basement for 20 something years. When I got it, it had actual spider nests in the creases. White mold was growing all over it.
Today it looks like this...
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Lewis Leathers Star Lightning premature wear
- Thread starter Bat02
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I've been trying to figure out an answer to that question for the past 4 years.
I understand.
No way Jose, this is a 100% either a bad batch or just bad leather, period. No way to fix it, either. You got unlucky, but so did other folks who bought jackets made from this batch. Hope LL stands behind their products, sample/no warranty disclaimers notwithstanding.
Entropic Thunder
New in Town
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- 46
I’ve got to disagree with everyone here. I know a thing or two about leather. What you’re seeing here is called delamination, where the top coat becomes detatched from the leather typically because of either a chemical or mechanical process. Often you’ll see it on furniture, where body oils from sweat, and dirt will make their way through the topcoat and imbed into the leather itself, causing delamination as paint won’t stick to an oily substrate. This process can also occur chemically, by being exposed to a harsh solvent like acetone or various other solvents depending on the makeup of the paint finish itself. You said you had the sleeves shortened, if the sleeve ends have zippers the person who shortened the sleeves likely did so from the point where the sleeve attaches to the armhole. I’m guessing they scuffed the leather or marked it and then wiped it down with some acetone or other chemical, which soaked through the finish and caused the delamination in that area. They may also have wiped down some other areas of the jacket which became scuffed or marked in the process of this alteration. That’s my best guess, it could also just be a coincidence and a bad batch of leather but I’ve never seen or heard of this happening on it’s own in garment grade leather.
Thanks for your input but I think that’s unlikely. I had the sleeve shortened but they were shortened at the other end (zipper/ hand side). They had to remove 2,5 cm and with the shoulder pads and the amount of fabric to remove, no leather worker wanted to take the risk of doing it from the top. The reasoning was that the arm wouldn’t fit the arm hole if they took out that much and they were afraid of not being able to reattach the pads correctly. Another info worth mentioning, I’m working in an office and I do not manipulate chemicals as part of my job.
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I've been through many but so far just these two. Robert Crumb used to dig through garbage to find old issues of Mad magazine. I'm sort of drawing the line there though I did find a really sweet sherpa trucker jacket behind a dumpster.
Dragging that thing home was the closest I got to being dumped by my gf.
Lit Up
One of the Regulars
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- London, UK
If you have any issues at Lewis, the first person you should speak to on the phone, email or in person is James, who is the shop manager. He is a very nice and patient guy who will try his best to get the outcome that best suits the customer, although on some decisions he has to defer to Derek, the owner, who is not usually in the shop and does not usually attend to customers.
I ordered a jacket for my mother which had something similar. They expedited her a new jacket without argument. Whilst that was a MTO jacket and not a sample jacket, I find it very unlikely that LL will not refund something that so egregiously does not live up to the brand's reputation. I do understand though, that this might shake your confidence in buying something from Lewis.
I ordered a jacket for my mother which had something similar. They expedited her a new jacket without argument. Whilst that was a MTO jacket and not a sample jacket, I find it very unlikely that LL will not refund something that so egregiously does not live up to the brand's reputation. I do understand though, that this might shake your confidence in buying something from Lewis.
Looks like spilled by paint remover or brake fluid horror. Since it is just black, of course worse case scenario you can always air brush paint it with paint for textile that remains elastic, but since you say the damage seems spreading everywhere in various degree, seems the leather is gassing the paint off or something, usually pleather do that after few years... but i ve never seen it on leather.
Since you mentioned having the sleeve altered, is there a possibility that the shop who alter it make some marking with white marker and later wipe it down with something that is too harsh for this leather, aseton etc.
Since you mentioned having the sleeve altered, is there a possibility that the shop who alter it make some marking with white marker and later wipe it down with something that is too harsh for this leather, aseton etc.
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I doubt it’s that because the sleeves were shortened from the bottom and not from the top. Plus, out of the four times I’ve worn it, three were after I got it back from the shop and it’s only during the last trip back that I’ve seen this problem so like around 2-3 weeks after I got it back (I rotate my jackets)
Today I had the pleasant surprise to get an email from James stating that they'll take the jacket back and issue a full refund. They didn't have to do that so I'm extremely grateful to them for handling this issue this way and I also want to thank everyone here who showed their support and helped analyze the situation. In the email James mentionned that they had received a while ago a faulty batch of leather that was sent back to the tannery immediately and that this jacket was probably part of this batch and slipped through. I won't let this unlucky experience stop me from shopping with them in the future. Thanks again for your support and help.
Mistakes happen, it's how companies deal with them that is important.
Glad to see LL did the right thing.
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Excellent. And don't let this experience discourage you from buying LL gear. They are among the best jacket makers in the world for a reason.
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Good for LL. I thought they would look after you, even though it was a "Sample" jacket. A reputable company for sure.
AeroFan_07
I'll Lock Up
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- 5,685
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Very good to hear! I felt confident they would stand by their product. LL jackets do look amazing, however I have yet to ever try one on. Anyone know if there's a shop for them in the US?
Skyhawk
Vendor
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- 359
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- Portland, OR
Cool! There you go. Mystery solved. Glad it all worked out!
Only in LA.
They do usually have a booth at Inspiration (LA/NY)
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