I also purchased a 20 year old Kelly 32 in vache liegee leather last June. It was in very sad condition. It was so dirty inside and out that I didn't
Even want to touch it. However, the stitching was intact and I thought with a little cleaning, might turn out ok. Anyway, I took the bag to the Hermes in South coast plaza for spa treatment. I received a call 6 months later saying that the Beverly Hills shop cannot do the repairs on the bag so they have to send it to Paris for a repair and refurbish for a whopping $1400. I said okay and it came back 3 weeks ago. The outside of the bag looked much much better and they replaced three hardwares on the bag that were tarnished. Only caveat is Hermes does not clean the inside of a bag. When I got mine back, the huge ink (marker) stain was still there as well as a huge stain of caked in nail polish. I was dismayed. I took a chance and contacted Margaret's Cleaners in San Diego and they assured me that they work on all types of designer bags including Hermes. I figured it didn't matter how much I was willing to pay Hermes - they still wouldn't clean the inside of my bag. Valentina from Margarets called me after they received my bag and she said they will have to refinish the bottom of the bag after they try to remove the stain and nail polish. I just got the bag back 3 days ago and it was perfect!!! They did a stupendous job. There is a very minor shallow indentation where the nailpolish was but overall it's great! They only charged me $186.00. I recommend that it your bag does not require hardware or leather replacement, send it to Margaret's for cleaning because they are awesome. However, if your bag requires repair and refurbish then you have to send it to Hermes because only they have the original parts. Of course you have to wait a long time and pay top $$$.
tia
