Leather Care Breaking it in The leather will feel stiff at first. For wallets, we suggest starting with 1-2 cards per pocket. Within two weeks, the leather will break in and the pockets will hold cards more comfortably. Repeat this process if you'd like to carry more, but know that once you stretch the leather it won't go back. Better over time Real, high-quality leather is naturally absorbent. It picks up the oils from your skin and other elements it comes into contact with. Over time, this process will give the material a beautiful patina—a softer, darker quality that develops on the surface of the leather, giving it character that's uniquely yours. Treatment It's not essential but we recommend treating the leather with conditioning oil every 3-6 months. This helps the material stay healthy, wear evenly and last longer. Why Vegetable Tanned Leather When we first started making wallets in the basement of our Portland rental, we were using wool (hence the name Woolly). But we quickly realized a wool wallet doesn’t last very long. While it's a beautiful material and functions well for certain products (have you seen our coasters?), wool isn’t meant to stand up to the kind of heavy daily use that a wallet gets. Naturally, we turned to leather as the traditional wallet material of choice. But not all leather is the same! We learned that 90% of the world’s leather actually isn’t the kind that gets better as it ages (that beautiful "patina" effect people often talk about). These days, most leather is made using a process called chrome tanning. While this is a faster and cheaper way to treat leather—and it can produce vibrant colors and a soft touch right off the shelf—chrome tanning uses toxic chemicals that are harmful for the environment and the resulting leather doesn't have those authentic qualities that makes the material so beautiful and long-lasting. So, we use premium vegetable tanned leather from Wickett and Craig, one of the last vegetable tanneries in the U.S. "Veg tanning" is the authentic, age-old process of treating leather with organic tanning agents, such as oil from tree bark or other plant material. This process is designed to make the material more durable and resilient. And the best thing about vegetable tanned leather is how it ages. Every wallet develops a unique patina from its user. After a year or so, no two wallets look the same and nothing makes us happier than seeing our customers proudly show off the beautifully unique wallet they earned over time. Using vegetable tanned leather aligns with the values we share with today’s more conscious consumers. Here’s how: This leather lasts a lifetime so you can consume fewer, better things. The material is part of a more eco-friendly lifecycle that starts with giving life to a bi-product of the beef industry. It avoids the use of toxic chemicals in the production process, and the life of the product ends only if you want it to. By sourcing our leather from this Pennsylvania-based manufacturer, we are supporting another small business in our own economy and bypassing all the waste that comes with importing materials from overseas. We are proud to use traditional vegetable tanned leather—one of the most natural, best-aging, longest-lasting materials on the market.
