Serving Islington
Leather & Suede Cleaning in Islington
Leather and suede cleaning in Islington is handled from our workshop in Edmonton, a few miles north up the A10, and the whole borough falls inside the round our driver does, from EC1 at the City end to N19 up by Archway.
We take the item off you at your door or your porter's desk, put it in front of someone who knows what it is made of, agree the work with you first, then do it here rather than passing it along. Orders of £50 and upwards travel free in both directions.
The postcodes we cover here
Islington is stitched together from postcodes that mostly do not carry its name, which trips people up when they are working out whether they are in the area. All of these are covered:
- N1 for Angel, Islington proper, Barnsbury, Canonbury and the De Beauvoir edge
- N5 for Highbury and the streets around the Emirates
- N7 for Holloway, Nag's Head and the Caledonian Road
- N19 for Upper Holloway and the Archway end
- N4 for the Finsbury Park side
- EC1 for Clerkenwell, Finsbury and the Old Street fringe
If your postcode starts with N or EC, you are inside the collection area, whichever side of a borough boundary your street happens to fall.
Collecting from a borough of flats
Most of what we pick up in Islington comes from a flat rather than a house, and that changes the practicalities rather than the price.
Nearly every street is in a controlled parking zone, terraces run straight onto narrow pavements, and a good number of doors are entryphones into a converted house or a mansion block. None of that is a problem, but a few details make the pick-up quicker:
- Give us the flat number and the buzzer name if they differ, which in a conversion they often do.
- If your block has a concierge or a porter, we are happy to hand over and collect there instead.
- A neighbour or a next-door shop can take the bag if you would rather not wait in.
- Bulky items are easier for us than for you. A long sheepskin coat or a rug is awkward on the 43 bus and no trouble at all at your front door.
This is the part that makes the difference locally. Driving a heavy coat anywhere from N1 means finding somewhere to leave the car at both ends, and most people here do not have a car to start with.
What a small flat does to leather and suede
Islington is a borough of Georgian terraces, Victorian conversions, warehouse flats around Clerkenwell and estates in between, and almost none of it comes with a loft, a garage or a spare room. Storage is scarce, and scarce storage is what we see in the items that arrive.
Damp and mould. Period conversions, garden flats and basements hold moisture, particularly where washing is dried indoors through the winter. Leather and suede left in an unheated cupboard against an outside wall will grow mould on the surface and hold a musty smell in the lining. Both are treatable, and both get worse the longer they sit.
Crushing. Coats squeezed into a rail with no air either side lose their shape, and suede in particular flattens where it is pressed. A crushed nap reads as a dark, shiny patch, which people often mistake for a stain.
Plastic covers. The zip-up covers sold to protect a coat trap moisture against it. A breathable cotton cover, or nothing at all with a few centimetres of space, is safer.
Radiator drying. In a small flat the radiator is the obvious place to put a wet coat, and it is the fastest way to stiffen leather and shrink a lining. Wet leather wants a hanger, a cool room and time.
Bikes indoors. Hallway bikes leave chain oil on sleeves and hems at exactly shoulder and knee height, and oil that has soaked into the skin is the hardest mark of the lot to lift.
The work that comes in from Islington
Vintage finds from Camden Passage and Chapel Market
The antiques and vintage trade around Angel means a steady flow of old leather, shearling and fur through the borough. Pieces bought that way are often decades old, dry, stiff, and stored somewhere unheated for years before sale.
A good number of them clean up far better than their owners expect, because the hide underneath is usually sound and it is the surface, the dirt and the dryness that make them look finished. What no clean will fix is a perished lining, splitting at the folds or old moth damage.
It is worth having a piece looked at before you spend money on it, and cleaning and re-oiling is what our suede, sheepskin and shearling and leather garments services do. Older pieces often need a repair alongside the clean.
Jackets and bags that go to work in the City and Clerkenwell
The southern end of the borough runs into the City and the design studios around Clerkenwell Green, and the items that come from there are worn every day: leather jackets, good handbags, boots on pavements in all weathers.
Daily wear shows up as shine on the collar and cuffs, colour worn thin at the corners of a bag, and a general dulling that happens too slowly for the owner to notice. That is ordinary and it is what leather jacket cleaning and handbag cleaning are for. If a bag is the problem, our guide to what a specialist can save on a suede handbag is honest about which marks lift and which do not.
Spills from a night on Upper Street
Islington eats out. Upper Street, Exmouth Market and the streets around Angel are dense with restaurants and bars, and red wine, oil and coffee on suede is a normal Sunday morning problem here.
The rule is the same whatever was spilled: blot it, leave it to dry, do not rub it and do not attack it with water. Getting stains out of suede goes through it stain by stain, and a mark nobody has touched gives us far more to work with than one that has been rubbed at.
Winter pavements
Walking is the default way to get around here, and winter pavements are gritted. Salt draws up into suede boots as white tide lines, and it keeps drying the leather out for as long as it stays in the fibre.
It is much easier to deal with early than in March. Boots and shoes go through shoe, boot and trainer cleaning.
What collection costs
- Nothing either way on an order of £50 and upwards.
- £10 where the order comes to less, counted once against the booking rather than against every jacket in it.
- No charge for bringing things in yourself.
Prices are settled once someone has had the piece in their hands. Nothing is quoted from a category picked off a website, because two jackets that look alike can want completely different work.
Coming to us instead
You are welcome to bring things in yourself. The address is Unit F23a, Hastingwood Trading Estate, 35 Harbet Road, London N18 3HU. Weekday opening is 9am to 3pm, the unit is shut at weekends and on bank holidays, and the phone is 0208 981 3232.
From Islington it is a straight run north on the A10 through Stoke Newington and Tottenham, or the A1 and then across. If you are coming by public transport, the workshop sits between Silver Street and Angel Road, and it is worth ringing first so someone is expecting you.
If you have moved out of the borough, or you are sending something in from elsewhere in the country, the tracked postal service works the same way as a collection.
Islington is one slice of a wider round. Our North London page lists every postcode the van reaches, the trade work we take on for other cleaners, and what happens to a piece once it is on the bench.
Frequently asked questions
- Do you collect from Islington?
- Yes, across the whole borough. That covers N1, N4, N5, N7 and N19 as well as EC1 at the Clerkenwell and Old Street end. Any postcode beginning with N or EC is inside the collection area, so it does not matter which side of a boundary your street sits on.
- I live in a flat and I am out during the day. How does collection work?
- Give us the flat number and the buzzer name when you book. If your block has a porter or a concierge we can hand over and collect there, and a neighbour or a nearby shop can take the bag instead. Nothing needs to be left outside.
- How much is collection and delivery?
- Orders of £50 and upwards travel free in both directions. Smaller ones carry a single £10 for the trip, counted against the booking rather than against each jacket, so the number of pieces makes no difference to it. Dropping items in at the workshop is free.
- I bought a vintage leather or sheepskin coat at Camden Passage. Is it worth cleaning?
- Usually it is worth having looked at, because old pieces often clean up better than they appear, and stiffness and surface dirt are frequently the whole problem. What cleaning will not solve is a perished lining, splitting along the folds or existing moth damage, so it is best to know which you have before spending anything.
- My suede boots have white marks from gritted pavements. Can they be saved?
- Usually, and sooner is much better than later, because salt keeps drying the leather out while it sits in the fibre. Let the boots dry fully, brush the nap out, and avoid soaking them. Boots that are past that stage go through our shoe and boot cleaning service.
- A coat has gone musty in a damp cupboard. Is that a cleaning job?
- It is, and it is common in period conversions and garden flats. Surface mould generally lifts, and the smell is dealt with separately because it sits in the lining rather than on the outside. Get it out of the cupboard and let it air while you are waiting for it to be collected.
- Is there anywhere in Islington I can drop items off?
- Not at present. Every item is worked on in our own unit in Edmonton, N18, so things either come to us there or go on a door collection. We do not pass work to anyone else, and that is worth checking wherever you leave a leather item.
- Do you clean things other than jackets?
- Yes. Handbags, boots and trainers, gloves, sheepskin rugs, curtains and soft furnishings, and garments with leather, suede or fur trim all come through the workshop, along with repairs and alterations where a zip, a lining or a strap has gone.