I went to visit one of my stockists: Conker Shoes, in Devon last week. Conker hand make fabulous shoes in lots of brightly coloured leather which they sell online and through their lovely shop in Totnes.

As I was chatting to Simon, the owner, the converstion turned to leather and how to look after it. Everyone knows and expects shoes to get a little scuffed and require polishing but not many people worry about their handbags in the same way.

Along with his shoes, Simon sells little pots of the Woly brand of shoe polish that comes in fabulous colours. This interested me because when one of my customers asks about cleaning a scuffed leather handbag I usually suggest black or brown shoe polish for a black or brown bag but can only suggest a neutral polish for other colours. Simon agreed but also said that he sometimes sold the coloured polish for use on bags.

Now, Conker shoes sell lots of brightly coloured shoes so of course they stock lots of coloured polish – but where do the rest of us get it from? After all we need to match the colour to the leather so it could be difficult to buy it online! This was when Simon suggested using an artists pastel to ‘fill in’ the missing colour on the scuffed part (usually the base/corner of the bag), followed by a neutral polish to ‘set’ the colour.

Wow!

I went straight over the road to Simon’s local art shop and saw the Sennelier brand of pastels that will do the job perfectly.

Now since we don’t all live in or near Totnes, I have tracked down these solutions on the internet for you:

For coloured shoe polishes try www.victordebanke.co.uk who sell the Woly brand of coloured polishes online. You can also get some (but not all – yet!) of Simon’s stock colours (also Woly) at www.conkershoes.com

For Sennelier pastels, you need the Oil Pastels which come in loads of colours and can be bought individually at around £1.50 each. If you need to match the colour to your leather bag then best go to your local art shop to check the shade. You can buy online from Artist Material. They seem to stock a good selection of colours.

After using the pastel to cover the scuff marks on your bag, polish over with a neutral shoe polish and rub in completely so that you don’t risk getting any polish on your clothing next time you use your bag!

A big thank you to Simon of Conker Shoes for sharing this tip. I’ll be trying this myself next time I need to spruce up a handbag and I’d love to hear from you if you try it too!