My name is Julie. I am the director at Luxe Bag Spa.
Here at Luxe Bag Spa,
we restore luxury designer handbags.
I'm going to show you how we are going to restore
this very loved Chanel handbag.
This is a Chanel classic flap,
and it's about 12 to 15 years old.
A bag like this, the state that it's in,
it would be about $1,500.
After the restoration,
it could go to about 5,000 or 6,000 USD.
The bag definitely needs a really good clean.
We're going to do a full coloration
as well as take the strap apart
and make sure we're polishing all of the hardware.
This bag looks to have many years
of dirt and grime buildup on it.
First, we're going to go ahead
and clean the exterior of the bag
just with a gentle, mild leather cleaner
using a horsehair brush.
This really helps get into the leather
and the cracks of where the stitching is.
So we're able to really get a deep clean
without hurting any of the exterior leather.
I'm going to go in now
with our leather-moisturizing cream.
I want to use this actually
before I start pigmenting the bag,
because I don't want the bag to crack.
So I will just let this sit on for a little bit.
It has avocado oil in it,
so it will bring back a lot of its original moisture.
Now we've unraveled the entire chain,
and the reason that we're doing this is
because we want to polish the hardware separately
from it being attached
to the leather of the chain.
We're going to go in
with the same leather-cleaning solution
that we did for the exterior of the bag,
and we're going to also use
the gentle horsehair brush.
Now that we've finished cleaning,
I'm going to go in with a acetone-based leather primer.
So, we want to take off
even more pigment if we are able to,
just to make sure that the bag is prepped
and ready for the coloration.
Looking in the interior, you can see that
there is some of the original color still in here.
So this is actually what we're going
to be color-matching in the bag.
I'm going to go in with a small angled brush,
just so I have more control
over concealing these areas.
I like to think of the bags
as how you would do your makeup.
You want to conceal the darker spots first
before applying the rest of the pigment.
This just makes it more cohesive throughout
and makes the bag look like it did as the original.
I'm switching now to a larger paintbrush
when we're doing the full exterior coloration.
This just helps me cover
more surface area of the bag
and really get into those grooves.
I am painting this bag by hand
because I find I have a lot more control.
I'm going to apply filler to this area here
to make it smooth on this interior flap.
After the filler is completely dry,
we want to go in with a sander.
We just want to make sure that everything is level
and just looks natural on this flap.
As you can see here,
I have left the panel surrounding the CC
without any pigment,
and you can already see the color difference
between the two.
But the reason we're doing this is because
we don't want the silver polish to destroy
or deteriorate any of the pigment
that we're going to put on now,
since it is quite a harsh chemical.
So I go into all the hardware with a Q-tip,
just dipping it into the silver polish
and rubbing away any tarnish or dirt
that has collected over the years.
I'm going in with an angled brush
that I also used for concealing this bag.
I just want to be a little bit more precise
with painting around the CC.
And if I get any pigment on the CC,
it doesn't really matter.
I'm able to take a Q-tip and wipe that right off.
But I try and keep it as clean as possible.
Now I'm going to go in with the second layer,
and I'm doing this a little bit thinner
than the one prior.
Now we're going to look at doing coloration
on the strap here.
We're going to go in and conceal the dark marks,
just like we did on the exterior of the full bag,
and then go in and paint the entirety of the strap.
Even though we did polish
the entirety of this chain,
there is a few spots
that we want to re-silver-plate.
For these spots here,
we will use our re-silver-plating tool,
which we dip into a solution,
and with electromagnets it actually
puts silver back onto where it's scratched off
or tarnished off over time.
Now that the strap is completely dry,
we're going to weave it back together.
When doing this, we want to make sure
that the strap is completely straight.
And if it isn't,
then your Chanel bag is going to be turning
in a whole bunch of different directions,
so this is a really important step.
Using the same leather solution
that we did on the exterior,
I'm going to go in with a horsehair brush
and clean the inside here.
Luckily, we were able to get the interior quite clean,
so this won't have to be repigmented.
Now we're going to apply our topcoat.
For this particular bag, I chose a matte topcoat.
And this actually will lock in all the pigment
that we previously put on.
I am super excited
with how this restoration turned out,
and I'm so excited to see how the client likes it
when she receives her bag.