How To Clean Leather Jacket?

[SimonJester753]

I was walking my dog in the park after a rain. He got frisky and wanted to run, so we ran down a trail a bit, then we hit a section that was muddy. The mud was slick as grease and I slipped and fell face down. My leather jacket got covered.

I assumed the best thing to do would be to let it dry, then flake off as much mud as I could, then wipe with a wet sponge.

Even after flaking off the dry mud, there's still a lot of mud on the jacket.

What's the best way to go from here?

BTW, the jacket had been torn previously and I patched it. I contact cemented a piece of leather inside behind the rip and them used a vinyl paste made for leather repair to fill the rip. It gets set by heating it with an iron.

[abn]

Glad you didn't hurt anything other than your jacket! To clean it up, I think I'd use a wet sponge to very gently moisten, and then remove, as much dirt as possible. Obviously, the dirt/mud is abrasive, so work slowly and rinse off the sponge often. Thereafter, I'd use some sort of cleanser to get anything really worked in. I'd probably opt for either Lexol PH leather cleaner (orange bottle) or saddle soap. Once done, I'd definitely re-condition the leather with Lexol Conditioner (brown bottle).

Good luck!

[SimonJester753]

Thanks for the info.

However, I didn't wait. My method worked pretty well. I googled "cleaning leather jacket" and got info about cleaning a jacket in more "normal" condition. Then I had an idea. I googled "cleaning mud off leather chaps," figuring they are also made of garment leather. Some people actually put them in the washing machine.

Well, I don't have a washer and the laundromat is fussy about what you put in their machines, so I put it in the shower to hose it off, to remove the mud without abrasion. Then I used a moist sponge with saddle soap, then buffed with a soft cloth. After it dried I noticed a few spots I missed and touched it up.

Now it looks better then before I fell.

[abn]

Glad it worked out!