Very excited that the products are working!!! This bag has only undergone the "basic" system of Hydrator 3.3 - Fatliquor - Hydrator 3.3, and it already looks 90% better. See the first picture for before and after. It had a water stain that came right out, some discoloration, cracking healed, and color lightened. I found that I had to repeat the "basic" process 3 times in order to get it the way it is. Mostly because the leather was so severely dehydrated. To help me get the process right, I bought a moisture reader. When I saturated the leather with the Hydrator 3.3 the first time, I covered in plastic wrap for 48 hours. I found that at this time, the moisture reader read 24%. I know it shouldn't drop below 25% moisture in order to Fatliquor properly, so I quickly started the Fatliquor process. (the first time I did this without the reader, I believe the moisture level got way lower and that is why the Fatliquor did not get absorbed as well) I had some issues in determining how many times to repeat the Fatliquor process before moving to the Hydrator 3.3 once again. I had to go with my gut and ended up repeating the process on just the Fatliquor step 3 times. I would apply the Fatliquor until saturated and then allow to air dry until slightly moist but not fully dry, then I would check to see if the leather easily absorbed more of the Fatliquor if I sprayed it on the surface. The third time repeating this step, it seemed like the Fatliquor sat longer on the leather, therefore I felt it was time to move on. Then I saturated the leather with the Hydrator 3.3 again, using the horse hair brush to evenly apply, then I cut strips of the Towels from the Leather Doctor system (very important to use these towels in order for the process to work), and as I place each strip of towel on the vachetta leather, I sprayed the top of the towel and brushed over it with the horse hair brush to make it firmly stay in place. Then I let the bag sit for about 12-16 hours or until the paper towel was dry and falling off. When the towel fell off, it had a residue of an orange like color from wicking off the contaminants from the leather. I was left with the beautiful leather you can see in the second picture. Hope this helps others to understand the process better.

My question is what to do next? I was handling the bag a bit massaging the leather to lighten it up further and I got nervous that it wasn't protected and the oil from my hands could darken it yet again, so I sprayed the leather with the Protector B+. Then the next day, I realized there were still issues I wanted to address. There were still some scale like texture with brown spotting in spots and the handle still had more cracking. I was not sure if it was ok to do another process directly after applying the Protector or if I had to go back to the basic system of Hydrator - Fatliquor - Hydrator. I decided to move on. I now applied the Vachetta 2.8 to the entire surface of the leather in order to even out the appearance. I then repeated the process of layering the towels on top of the leather after applying the Vachetta 2.8 to the leather. I sprayed the Vachetta 2.8 on top of the towels as well and used the horse hair brush on top of the wet towels to adhere it to the leather in order to wick away as it dried. I'm currently in the middle of this process. Did I pick the wrong thing to do next? Should I have considered repairing the cracks with the Impregnator- 26 and Bond -7A first before using the Vachetta 2.8? Please confirm or correct as it will help me in the future. In fact a lot of my bags have cracks that need repairing and I am not sure at what point I should address the repair. I also don't understand what product specifically to purchase to color correct after doing a repair to the cracks with the Impregnator- 26 and Bond -7A.

Thank you once again for all your assistance!!!!

Sincerely,

Gwen




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