Things I Learned From Leather

We purchased a custom leather sofa about seven years ago.  Before that, my husband came home one day from one of his projects with a leather library chair.  I love both of these pieces of furniture – they are just perfect for us! 

And I was recently thinking about what a major change these pieces have made in our living room makeover and realized my leather furniture has taught me a few things..  These aren’t major revelations, but I thought I would pass along the wisdom, all the same. 

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1. Our house is FULL of dust and dirt.

I mean more than I even thought before.  Granted, we live in the desert, so sand is something we just simply have to deal with.  But we have what is called microdust here, too! It seeps into the tiny (and I mean tiny) cracks in the seals of our windows – the ones that allow us to open our windows – the seals of our doors, everywhere! 

Even if I were to close up our house for a month and not open or close a door, I would get lots of outside dust inside.  That dust settles on everything, especially furniture.  I am used to cleaning the surfaces I can see dust collecting on, but the leather opened my eyes to just how much dust settles on our seating. 

Before, we had a microfiber couch that I thought I kept pretty clean, but my leather has taught me just how much dust accumulates on the surface of my seating pieces – A LOT.  I find myself cleaning, wiping down our leather pieces a few times a week.  Before I used to clean our microfiber sofa a few times a year…no wonder our allergies were nuts!  By the way, I shared over at Ask Anna how to Spring Clean Your Upholstered Furniture, so you can keep your furniture dust-free!

2. Leather likes to age.

I love, love, love the look of distressed leather.  And guess what?  My leather loves it, too!  It just gets better looking over time as we crash into it at the end of the day and lounge all over it to watch TV. 

It will last for SO long and still look great.  But every once in a while, when I get paint on it (yes, I got paint on it!) or when one of my kids colors on it with crayon (!), it cleans up really easily and still looks great.

I even like it when there is a new crease  in it.  I have no idea how old our library chair is, but it still looks great – even after almost a decade of kids jumping up and insisting on reading marathons and horsey rides. 

My favorite method for cleaning leather is using these great products from Chemical Guys – I even use them to clean my leather purses!

3. Leather needs friends.

Leather can be a bit cold, so it needs a little warm up.  We have taken our time to find the right pillows, blankets, and accessories for our leather pieces.  And we have been so happy with some of the options out there. 

We found a great pouf from the Land of Nod for our leather library chair.  And we found some reasonably priced throw pillows at Target for our chair and our couch. 

I just love curling up on the end our leather couch and watching a great movie.  And the library chair and pouf are irresistible to our little ones – they love to play and read over there.

4.  There is such a thing as too much leather in a room.

My husband and I really love our leather seating.  But as we were working on filling out the rest of the room, we made sure we stayed away from more leather chairs.  Our look is kind of in the eclectic industrial realm (it is not clearly defined) and leather works really well for it, but too much would be overboard for us. 

We were so, so pleased when we found a chair that fit into our aesthetic and didn’t have a bit of leather on it.  We are so happy with the balance that is created by mixing textures and fabrics.

Do you have any leather furniture in your home?  I would love to hear the lessons you have learned by having it in your home.