How Can You Tell If It's Really Leather?

We use a lot of gorgeous, high quality leather to create our handmade One of a Kind, Islander and Rustic Leather Collections. So when we came across this blog post about a company that had been told one of their album manufacturers had been mislead into selling what they thought was leather, but was not, we wanted to share it.

The post about how to determine what real leather looks like came from finao. They are a company that produces "unique, hand-crafted albums for professional photographers" so we knew they were a reputable source. 

"Leather comes in different thicknesses and the back can have a shag. These thicker leathers need to be “shimmed” to fit better when two leathers are joined or “shaved” when the back side shag would leave bumps in your album. Just sayin’, it takes a lot of material, skilled workers and time to make the best album for your clients. 

I hope these pictures and this brief explanation can show that there is no mistaking leather and non-leather. Honest or not – they are not the same product and you can’t miss the obvious. At Finao we know the difference and we want you to know that when you deliver a beautiful leather album to your clients you’re getting the real thing.

Please enjoy our iPhone photo tour of our material storage racks. :)"

"Real leather comes in the shape of animals." 

"Real leather looks like leather on the backside."

"Real leather has major imperfections we must trim around, see the image below, so we get less useable material from each hide.  It also has subtle imperfections which add to the richness of the finished album."

"Non-Leather as you can see below is easy to spot and there is no mistake that it can be a real animal hide.  Notice how it comes on a roll like wrapping paper and how it has a distinct man made texture to the back."

(via finao)