How To Keep Leather Office Furniture In Great Shape

Business Articles

If you have a sitting room or waiting area in your office, then adding leather furniture to this space can surely leave an impression of success as well as customer satisfaction. Leather office furniture is expensive though, with a single genuine leather coach ranging in price from $2,000 to $4,000. While you can save yourself a few thousand dollars by going with a bonded leather couch made from remnant materials, your couch will still be pricey. This means that you should take good care of your investment by caring for the leather properly. Keep reading to find out about a few tips that can save your leather furniture from ruin.

Place Furniture Away From The Sun

If your office is like many others, then it contains a single or double set of glass doors at the front. If the office has more of a wide and airy feel, then the sitting room has many windows. Unfortunately, these windows may allow sunlight to hit the leather furniture and cause the items to either dry out or fade. The leather fades because the sun causes the natural color pigments in the leather to break down during a process called photodegredation. While this is likely to happen slower across a leather surface than it is to a piece of furniture made from an artificially dyed fabric, fading will be noticeable over time. Drying occurs because the heat that it radiated by the sun is absorbed by the dark leather. This will dry out the oils in the hide.

If you can, set your furniture back in your sitting room away from your windows. Also, think about placing the furniture in areas that are closer to windows that face the north and south side of the building. This will help to keep the leather away from the sun rays that shine in through the east windows in the morning and the west windows late in the afternoon. If these things are not possible, then purchase some window films to place on the window to block the sun. Insulating, glare-reduction, and privacy films all reduce 99% of UV rays, so choose the kind that fits your office environment. 

If your office is in a cold weather area, then consider insulating films that will help to protect your leather furniture and retain up to 55% of the heat in the building. Keep in mind that you want to retain some light in the sitting area, so make sure that light transmission is around 49% so the area is still somewhat bright.

Condition The Leather

If you want your leather furniture to last, then you need to make sure that it retains moisture. Furniture that dries out from the heat, sun, or from cold air can crack relatively quickly. However, while you want to keep the oils in the leather, you also need to allow the furniture to breathe. When leather is treated with oil-based conditioners, like the ones made with olive oil, the oil seeps deep into the leather and smothers it. This will cause oil stains to surface. Wax-based conditioners work their way into the top part of the leather and keep the pores open. Natural beeswax is one of the best conditioners to use and so is fat-ladden cocoa butter. You will need to prepare your conditioner first, so pick up some beeswax and cocoa butter at your local home store.

Place one cup of beeswax, one cup of cocoa butter, and one-half cup of water in a pan. Place the pan on your stove on medium heat until the wax starts to melt. Gently stir the ingredients together until they form a homogenous mixture. Remove the pan from the heat and continue stirring until the mix starts to thicken. Spoon your conditioner into a glass jar. Once it cools, use a clean cotton cloth to remove the conditioner from the container. Massage it into the surface of the leather furniture. Afterwards, use another clean cloth to buff the entire surface of the leather to remove excess conditioner. Make sure to repeat the conditioning process every four or five months or when the surface of the leather starts to appear dull. 

Share

27 January 2016