Advice on cleaning this leather binding

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Advice on cleaning this leather binding

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1Sami_Bolman
Fev 10, 2014, 7:51 am

I got a nice leather-bound book that was grossly mistreated by the previous owner who is a neighbour. According to him he was trying to clean fingerprint marks using a sponge and soap, but then the soap left dark streaks in the leather. For some reason he thought it could be fixed by applying colourless shoe wax, but it only created more dark marks. Finally he tried a solvent to remove all that mess, but it created that even darker spot on the right half of the cover. Here is photo of how it looks now

http://feb.imghost.us/Cq98.jpg

And a photo of the other side to show the original condition, save a little dark area on the top corner which is a spill over from the things that were applied to the other side

http://feb.imghost.us/Cq9R.jpg

The leather is just 15 years old and in perfect condition without any damage. What products and procedures could be used to remove that mess and restore it as close as possible to original?

Thank you

2booksforreading
Fev 11, 2014, 4:09 pm

I recommend leaving it alone. This will probably be the safest choice; however, if I find any possible solutions for your question, I will post again.

Oiling will make the leather slightly darker, and any other cleaning or treating will in all probability affect the color, too. Whatever treatment you do, it would most probably need to be done for the entire surface of the leather to keep the color uniform.

Since the book is only 15 years old, the leather most probably does not need any oiling, unless the book was kept in an extremely dry environment.
I hope this helps...

3Sami_Bolman
Fev 12, 2014, 12:01 pm

Thank you very much, I will leave it alone. If you think of something or think that a product could help a little please let me know.