Whoops?

So.. I thought I had washed all my shoe-shining rags thoroughly.

It turns out that I didn't. So now I have a streak of "discoloration" as it were, down the middle of a tan shoe where I wiped it with a bit of black polish.

How do I remove this? Lexol cleaner? I'm somewhat leery as I have once wiped a bit of the shoe's dye off of a shoe by rubbing too hard.

Thanks in advance for the advice.

Anyone?

Can't you work that in with tan shoe cream and polish? I'm sure it won;t go away immediately but with some elbow grease I would think it would become unnoticable.

Kronik, it shouldn't be that hard to fix. I think I would probably take a little rubbing alcohol (70% or even 99%) from the drugstore, dilute it a bit, and gently remove the black. This will definitely take off the black, but it will likely cause the underlying and immediately-surrounding tan to go a little dull and perhaps a tad lighter. However, it should be easy to restore the tan color with a little cream and wax polish, or possibly polish alone. You might have to work it in somewhat and work a little at blending it with the finish that's already there. After working on the place where the alcohol was applied, you might also want to redo (with cream and polish) the whole area of the shoe where the black was to get it all to match in shade and tone. Good luck!

I don't use rags for application, since I use either the sponge applicator on the AE creams or a horsehair applicator for the stuff in the tins, plus brushes and buffing cloths. But what I do is have one complete set of brushes for black, one complete set of brushes for all browns and burgundies. I also use 4 or 5 buffing cloths - one for black, one for dark brown, one for medium, one for light tans, and one for burgundy.

When wax polishes get a little dried out it is harder to use an applicator. A rag then works better but in my case I just use my bare fingers which work quite well too. I know it gets the fingers discolored but using rags also causes that problem as well.

I'd start with tan polish (work it in and wipe it off, don't let it dry then buff as you normally would), then go to rubbing alcohol or vodka, Lincoln Dry Cleaner, then acetone in that order.