Club Obi Wan

Indiana Croft wrote: ↑Sat Nov 18, 2023 3:15 pm Welcome to COW, you’re in for good things.
That and

Jacket looks good on you. Once broken in, it’ll conform to you.

So, I too love to tweak my new jackets, even S&J who distress before assembling. Quite an art.

So I too had a Wested with the same grey undertones, has something to do with how the leather is finished.
No expert on the terminology, you do some searching in the distressing section, and you’ll find a lot of info.

So after I’d done my distressing on my Wested, I had the same grey undertone, there’s a dark brown leather dye (Fiebings leather dye).
Put on carefully but it’ll make the grey brown and you’ll be happy.
When I did mine I rubbed it all over, lightly.

Do some research and see me all over the place.

Croft

Indiana Croft wrote: ↑Sat Nov 18, 2023 4:34 pm My last S&J DoD didn’t have too much of shine to it.
With that said, be cautious and tred lightly.
Do your research.

Here’s what I did.
Give it a rub down of rubbing alcohol. This tends to help remove the shine some. And removes some of the color, acetone will remove more so be cautious.
Then get it wet, not soaked, you can do this when you can wear it out side and the heat and sunshine will help dry it.
But to start to bring out the grain.
Then I hit mine lightly with the acetone.
Allow to dry, rub down again with a heavy cloth with nothing on it,
Do your light distressing in the areas you want to hit. Remember, once you over due it, you’ve over done it. Light distressing goes a long way.

Then hit it lightly with Pecards to helps restore the jacket some. Chemicals can hurt the jacket so Pecards help restore it .
You can always do more later. I do, never stop playing with my jackets.

So once you do this, now you take a cotton cloth and put the dye on it and rub it all over, the grey will now have a brown, try it in area that you don’t see like underneath the pocket flap.

But I can’t stress enough, go slowly, do your research, I’m sure there’ll be others with there’s thoughts and process.
Some will do this, but I even tweaked my DoD and I’m very pleased.

And if you can somehow find a manaquin to hang the jacket on, makes it easier to see the areas to distress.

These are things I’ve done to an 800. Cockpit jacket, I like my jackets to look like I’ve owned them for years.
Some jackets can take awhile to distess naturally, so a little help never hurts, but this is me.

Heck I have U.S.A. jacket that was to big, soaked it, threw in the dryer to shrink it, then slathered them picards on it.

Croft

Indiana Croft wrote: ↑Sat Nov 18, 2023 5:33 pm Just a before and after shots of my DoD
Don't have any current of my Cockpit jacket. Which is also Goatskin, which is very durable/harder to distress, but go slow, must be your manta, my Wested was lamb, but had the grey undertone, which didn't look right.
There's a thread that talks about it.

Before (and was already awesome, but as I said, i like to to tweak), my attempt was more of a blending. I don't like a heavy scratch look.





After my tweaking.





This jacket s breaking in nicely and the texture/grain of the leather, I need to try and take some close ups.

Croft