Redye of a Calcaire City. From barely pink to full-on purple!

squidgee

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Jan 20, 2015
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Hi everyone! So, several weeks ago I purchased a Calcaire City off of eBay. It looked ok in photos, some spots and discoloration on the bottom, but for the price I thought it would be a nice “project bag” to clean and rehab. Some new sealant, a lil bit of leather paint on the dark spots, maybe new cord on the handles, not too crazy right?

Unfortunately the seller lied to me and said the bag had not been redyed, but when I received the bag it had clearly been worked on and the dye was peeling and crackly in areas.

I tried to communicate with the seller to get a return or compensation because clearly they misrepresented the item, but they never responded back to me, and I was not up to a long eBay fight, so I decided to just drop it and do a redye plus rehab of the whole bag.

Now, I am an avid DIYer and have done a lot of painting and dye jobs on other items before, so I thought this would be a similar process. I also read a ton of info on other gals’ redye jobs on the forums (and especially a great one by kerryisntreal) so I figured, what the heck, let’s do this! So here we are, and after seeing the great wealth and knowledge on these forums, I hope you don’t mind my small contribution. :smile:
 
Step 1: Remove previous dye job.

This was honestly a LOT of work because I had to strip all the old, peeling paint off the bag.
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The dye used was not a penetrating dye, so it never sank into the leather skin, just sat on top and that’s why it started to peel and flake off.
I used pure acetone to strip off the old paint and expose the original color and leather underneath.
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Using a dauber to apply the acetone and an old towel to rub it off, the whole process took about 18 hours of work total. The hardest part was getting into all the nooks and crannies and in between the wrinkles, plus I made sure to take breaks in between because I was working with acetone. (In small doses as a nail polish remover, acetone is ok, but prolonged exposure is a very bad idea.)
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After I got all the gunk off, I could see just what the old girl was hiding.

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Discoloration plus darkening of handles and scuffs and even a ink dot on her butt. Poor thing!
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Step 2: Remove cord on handles.

The cord on this bag was shot, so I knew they had to be replaced before I proceeded with the dye job.
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It was a scary process but necessary, and quite cool to reverse-engineer the whole thing!

First I pulled out the long bit that was tucked into the handle.
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Then it was a relatively easy process of pulling the cord out of the holes to the other end of the handle.
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I tried to remove the stitches in one long piece so I could easily measure them for the new cord length, but some bits separated so I had to cut those parts before proceeding. In the end, I pulled the pieces together and estimated each cord was about 24 inches long.
 

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At this point I want to give a huge THANK YOU :hbeat::wave::wave: to kerryisntreal for sharing her own dye process and where to get a really good dupe cord for Bal bags!

She recommended Pacific Trimming in her thread and I ended up purchasing the same cord, and I gotta say, spot-on! I compared their cords with the ones on the Bals and they look practically the same!

Here's kerry's thread, which I found SUPER helpful beyond words. I followed this thread way before I even bought my Calcaire and it was this thread that got me thinking about redyed Bals: http://forum.purseblog.com/balenciaga/dye-project-in-progress-892624.html

So again, huge thank you kerryisntreal!:P

And here's the link to the shop where I bought the cord:http://www.pacifictrimming.com/default/jwaxed-cord.html
 
Step 3: Gather the dye materials

For this dye project I used:

Pure acetone (as a deglazer/prepper)
Tandy Eco-flo Professional Waterstain in Purple
Tandy Eco-flo Professional Finish in Clear Matte
Fiebing’s Acrylic Resolene in Neutral

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I’ve used Tarrago Self-Shine dye on previous projects, so I was familiar with the product and am glad to see it works on Bal bags as well.

However, I do know the Tarrago Self-Shine isn’t a penetrating dye, meaning it doesn’t really soak deep into the leather fibers, and from experience I know a scratch or scuff on the dye coat can expose the original color underneath, so that was a no-go for me.

For lasting results pro leatherworkers and restorers recommend penetrating dye, and Fiebing’s Professional Oil Dye in particular. However, there’s a big problem with that because I live in California and some Fiebing’s products are banned here! :nogood:

California apparently has a ban on products with certain chemicals in them, and those chemicals just happen to be in Fiebing's, so there was no way I could buy them from anywhere in CA or even have those products shipped over (well… maybe I could have tried but let’s not break the law here).

So in the end I went with some Tandy Eco-flo Professional Waterstain dyes, which are supposedly more eco- and health-friendly and are allowed for sale in California. They seem to work well enough from what I’ve read on other sites, perhaps not as easy to work with a Fiebing's, but as I can’t get Fiebing’s anyway I don’t know what I’m missing so… onward! :wlae:

I also could not get Fiebing’s Deglazer as it was another one of those banned products. In this case a good substitute would be denatured alcohol or acetone. The purpose of the deglazer is to strip any old dye or finish on the item and “prep” the leather for taking the new dye. I already had acetone and had stripped the leather of my bag anyway so I was covered for this step.

Lastly, I grabbed some topcoat finish to seal the leather and prevent the dye from bleeding out. I initially went with the Tandy Finish but did not have good results with it, so I got Fiebing’s Acrylic Resolene instead (thank goodness Resolene IS ok for sale in CA!)
 
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Ok, so all prepped and ready. Here are a few last shots of Ms. Calcaire in her original, un-dyed state.

When I first received the bag the leather was already not the typical 05 smooshy, pillowy goodness due to the previous dye job. It felt a bit plasticky, but still a bit soft and pliable at least.

After the acetone stripping job the leather further got dried out. It’s still soft and has a great grain, but I accepted that it wasn’t going to feel like 05 leather again.

I’ve been told that I could try to re-moisturize the leather prior to dyeing, so I did some tests and put Neatsfoot compound, Apple Conditioner, and Leather Honey, but they all made it harder for the dye to stick and seep into the bag, so I abandoned that idea.
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Step 4: Dye!


The bag is all prepped and ready for the dye. I dampened the leather a bit to help the dye penetrate into the fibers before the first coat went on.
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The first coat went over blotchy and you can tell where the more wet bits are from the dark patches.
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After this pass I noticed even after stripping and prepping there were still bits of old paint left behind, which turned up as whitish dots since the dye couldn't penetrate past the barrier.
 

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After the bag was dry to the touch I ended up very lightly sanding those areas with a 150 grit sandpaper to remove the paint and expose the bare leather.
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It was great to see that only after one coat and after sanding the bag, the dye has already worked in and really penetrated through the fibers.

I went over the whole bag again with the dye and spot-dyed the blotchier areas with a third coat.