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Vegetable Tanned Natural Leather & Olive Oil..match made in heaven

tnjyoung

A-List Customer
Messages
435
Location
Tennessee
So recently I purchased a vegetable tanned Corter belt in a natural finish. When it arrived and I tried it on, it was just too "white" for me. I began to research how to darken leather and I ran across an old method where olive oil was used. Boy am I happy I did. Here is the result. It was fun, too.
image.jpg
 

tnjyoung

A-List Customer
Messages
435
Location
Tennessee
I make a paste from olive oil and beeswax. It's pretty much what I use on all heavier leathers.

That sounds like a winner. I read people's warnings about rancidity, but I am not too worried. Time will tell. My thoughts are that with wear the stain will stay, but the organic components of the oil will dissipate.
 

resortes805

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,019
Location
SoCal
I picked up a hand-tooled natural leather wallet that I am letting nature takes its' course in building patina.
 

mattface

Practically Family
Messages
877
Location
Montpelier, VT
That sounds like a winner. I read people's warnings about rancidity, but I am not too worried. Time will tell. My thoughts are that with wear the stain will stay, but the organic components of the oil will dissipate.

I started using this on Brooks bicycle saddles about 6 years ago, when I was out of Proofide, and happened to have a big cake of beeswax on hand. I thought it sounded like a pretty good idea, so I looked it up and found that people had been using that mixture on tack and saddle leather for a long time. I've been applying it to all my bike seats a couple times a year ever since and never had any problem, and never been tempted to pay $12 for a little 25 gram tin of Proofide again.
 

Feraud

Bartender
Messages
17,188
Location
Hardlucksville, NY
Olive oil is frequently used on veg tan leather to moisturize before or after dying. As you see it darkens natural leather a shade or two.
You should be good to go on that belt!
 

tnjyoung

A-List Customer
Messages
435
Location
Tennessee
Okay, I must admit, the photo I uploaded was taken just after the application of oil. It lightened about two shades by the end of the day. So I applied three additional coats of oil last night. Here is an updated photo from this morning. image.jpg
 

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