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[Marty]

Some may have seen my recent post in here asking about leather treatments... on another note, how about leatherette?  I'm talking about the fabricy sort of fake leather seen on early Brownies, etc.  While it seems to be more stable than real leather

[Don_m]

Mary--
 
Leatherette/fake leather on early Brownies--/ how early are you talking---20's -30's---Pre Graduate
(plastics/pleather)try some Lexol Mrs. Robinson.

[Marty]

Howdy Don M...
     I'm talking Brownies from 1900 on up to the late teens.  These are old, but still not valuable or rare,so I'd suppose a reasonable answer would be why bother? but a row of the things can still be kind of interesting.
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[Mikel]

Probably the best advice came from the British Museum many years ago.
 
Unfortunately, I don't have the link but it involved beeswax and several other ingredients. I am sure it would be as good for fake leather as well as real leather.
 
Hop

[Sevo]

Artificial leather from the pre synthetics age is mostly oil treated paper with limited amounts of leather shavings and/or elastics (rubber, guttapercha) added. It can be treated with products approved for museal and archival leather care.  
 
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[Glenn]

Mikel,
 
The product is marketed as 'Renaissance Wax'. I have used it for a number of years on all types of camera coverings and metal work - painted or chromed. The product works well and produces a nice lustre to the finish.

[Marty]

Hmmm.  I'll have to try to run some of that Renaissance Wax down...  Thanks!
                        Marty

[Bill_alexander]

Marty,  
Every year I haul out all my old Kodaks the Autographic and Box Brownies, some 100 of them I
use a good grade of wax based black shoe polish
and wet cotton , brings them back to luster and  
does preserve them to some degree..wort