How To Clean A Real Leather Jacket

You may think you have to take leather clothing (real or faux) to a leather care expert or buy a lot of expensive leather products. But that's not necessarily true. Most spot leather cleaning can be done at home with a product you may already have on hand.

Big cleaning jobs may still require the help of a leather care expert. Some heavy-duty stains may not come out from the method we're talking about here. The sooner you clean after a spill, the better your chances of getting it out yourself – especially with leather furniture.

In the case of leather furniture pieces, it's especially helpful to know how to take care of small stains and areas that collect hand oil, such as arms of chairs and sofas. For leather jackets, shoes, bags, etc., they collect dirt from outdoor pollutants as well as from your skin.

Here you see the collar of a leather jacket I've worn every winter for many years.

The collar goes against my neck and gets my natural oils, plus hair products and moisturizer on it. That leaves a nasty whitish film which was actually sticky to the touch. I know – gross, right?

And here's a closeup of a shoulder with a similar white film from hair products:

Now, there are a lot of theories about how to clean leather (and faux leather), and most of them involve not getting the leather wet. They also talk about how delicate leather is, as if it's not famous for holding up to decades of wear and tear.

But leather jackets get rained on all the time. As do leather shoes, purses, etc. It may not stand up well to being soaked for long periods, but it can definitely handle getting wet, especially if you dry it quickly.

I think it's much more important to make sure you use a gentle solvent and make sure it's fully removed than to worry about a little bit of water. If you're concerned about water, use a leather conditioner to make it more waterproof. This affordable leather product will last for years.

So this is the way I've cleaned this jacket for years, and it works for me, and the jacket looks like new when I'm done. This method is also great for cleaning spills or dirt on leather furniture, purses, shoes, etc.

How to Clean Leather

Put a teaspoon of baby shampoo into a cup of water and stir it up to make bubbles.
Take a cloth and dip it into the diluted baby shampoo mixture just enough to get it damp. Scrub the dirty area – I use circular motions and not a lot of pressure.
Take another cloth which is barely damp, and quickly buff over the areas where you used soap.
Take a towel, and quickly buff over the same area to remove some of the dampness.
Let it dry somewhere inside your home – not out in the sun.
Once it's thoroughly dry – and leaving it overnight is preferable – you can apply leather conditioner if you want to use it.

Shoulder of leather jacket after cleaning

It's that simple. And for really small spots that haven't really ground into the leather, you can often just use a dry cloth. You don't need to buy a lot of leather products or take every item of clothing to a leather cleaner.