Leather furniture construction

Posted by John under Furniture

Often you will see stories in the media about leather furniture retailers offering poor quality products at a high price. Sometimes when they make the furniture any scratches that are evident are covered up with shoe polish. Yes, they use all sorts of tricks and that is because they are not using “high grade” leather like they claim (there is no such thing really and the fact that they can drop the price by half during sales shows that).

In a related story, I went to a leather products maker to get him to make a genuine leather belt for my trousers. I was sick of the poor quality, inferior leather imitation ones in most retail department stores. So the guy made one up and I picked it up a week later. I was expecting cowhide but got what is commonly referred to as buffalo hide and he told me that is what it was.

That is really goat or pig hide and you can see that in the folds near the holes which will crack within 6 months. I still bought the belt from the guy because I can tell that it will last longer than the department store ones but it is annoying when people give you something other than what you ask for and pay for. Needless to say I will not be going back to that guy or others in small stores like that.

Now, “buffalo hide” is what some leather furniture is made of. Retailers often call it “high grade” which is a load of nonsense. They even proudly mention it on their web sites. Those retailers are the ones to avoid. Buffalo hide is not suitable for regular wear and tear and so if you buy a cheap “leather” lounge that is made of this then the kids will have it wrecked in no time just from jumping on it regularly.

So the trick is to ignore claims of “high grade” leather and look at what the grain of the leather actually is e.g. vinyl with some corrected grain leather on the top – most furniture retailers offer junk made from this poor quality rubbish at a rip off price that leaves them laughing all the way to the bank.

The real deal is called full-grain leather in aniline or semi-aniline finish. If you want the real genuine leather with the expensive price to go with it then this is the grain to look for. And make sure there is no vinyl on the back with just the full-grain leather on top (a trick many use in furniture construction so they squeeze more profit out of suckers). Anything other than this at a cost of several thousand dollars is just plain rubbish that you are being ripped off for so avoid any retailer that sells poorer quality junk at the cost of full-grain leather furniture.

Full-grain leather retains the top layer of the hide with all its imperfections. It offers the best breathability and durability. As you would expect then, a patina will develop over time showing all the natural signs of aging that you will not get from lower quality leather. It is a great investment then that can last many years. You probably should use a protection cream because of that but at least you will not need to use shoe polish or other outrageous tricks like many shonky furniture manufacturers and retailers do all so often (then they can say that you scratched it when you got it home).

Be careful what you buy when it comes to leather furniture and avoid the crooks that just rip you off with false claims.