Deckers Darkened (dyed)

Ark Hunter · Post by **Ark Hunter** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 4:46 pm

I've tryed many ways of darkening my pair of J. Crew Deckers, but none worked real well and most rubbed off on clothing and anything else that rubbed against them. (don't sit indian style on the carpet after useing Meltonian cream on boots either...luckly the carpet cleaning spay we had got it out) I've tryed Pecards, brown pecards, Meltonian cream in dark brown and mahoganay, brown shoe polish and while they look good for a while, they don't get them good and dark and neither do they stay on for any length of time, so I finally broke down and dyed them. With minimal leather dying experience I dived in. (I dyed a Todd's whip holder that was a light color as a test)

First, I used Lincoln Dye Preparer on them (or Fiebings has something like that too) to take off any old polish, wax, and coating on the leather.
Next, I had some Mahogany Fiebing's and tested that on the back heal strip of one boot, and I had a custom mix (about 5:1:5) of Lincoln Dark Brown, Ox Blood, and 80% rubbing alcohol to thin it down and tested that on the heal strip of the other boot. I let them dry for about a half hour and went back to see what the looked like. They were pretty close, but the Mahogany was darker and I thought the other Mix was a little too red, so I dumped in about 5 parts of the Mahogany into the custom mix and used that. (5:1:5:5) I used the little wool dobbers you can buy for applying leather dye. Here's how they came out.

An Alden, and the dyed Deckers

Some older pictures for reference.

An Alden (front), and Deckers somewhat altered. I'm not sure what had been done to them at this point. Less than the below picture though.

An Alden and a Decker with several coats of various Meltonian cream applyed.
And a link to my close enough boot page from a while back.

Texas Jones · Post by **Texas Jones** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 6:07 pm

Those boots look great! I dyed my deckers as well and turned out looking a little too dark. I should've used a lighter color to start with. They aren't bad though.

I notice the threads on your boots are now dark. That happened to mine and I was a little bummed, but after awhile and some cleaning with a mild detergent, those threads will get white again. Try it out, it won't hurt the boot at all if you don't overdo the detergent.

Ark Hunter · Post by **Ark Hunter** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 9:55 pm

Hmm, yeah I didn't think you could get them light again after that. I'll have to try that. I figured it was just the price you pay.

They actually look a little darker than that picture in most light, but I still think they look good.