Real WWII A-2 Patch?

[Maj.Nick Danger]

ALL the fakes that go through Auction Houses such as Sotherbys and Christies have "provenance". Any good faker can fake the provenance just as easily as the item it relates to. A forensic scientist would probably spot it - but would a collector?

Hans Van Meegeren even fooled Goring with his fake Vermeers. He bought cheap 17th century canvases and removed as much of the paint as he could, then mixed bakelite of all things, into the oil medium to simulate centuries old hardened paint.http://www.artbabble.org/video/boijmans/van-meegerens-fake-vermeers Maybe an enterprising forger could obtain old worn leather and produce convincing forgeries of rare patches. Good reason not to collect patches, as Andrew pointed out.

 

[majormajor]

So use?
Though I dont advocate faking patches but I am always interested in making repro patches and ageing them for my own repro jackets, and also anyone that has a second hand repro, they just dont look right with brand new patches. The thing about painting them is to get them to look right it takes ages, usually a couple of months.
I have made multi piece, painted and even had a go at tooling though I have never sold a patch as original.
As for original materials, they come in lots of different styles, painted on leather, painted on canvas, woven(embroidery?) felt with bullion, chenille, multi layered leather, tooled and now I have heard of printed. I would guess the tooled leather is the hardest to fake the 60 years of wear and patina.

An interesting thread and a great way to spend a rainy Sunday
JT

I did a number of "painted" A2s a few years ago.

I used a very simple logic. How do they colour leather? With dye....... So that's what I used....

Leather dyes can be obtained in a number of primary colours, and can be mixed to produce others.

After around two weeks, a combination of a scouring stone,shoe polish and a couple of other tricks can produce anything from a couple of years to a few decades of wear. And they never smell of paint.....