Removing burnish on shoes

I have a nice pair of Edward Green RLPL Cardiff Chestnut shoes with the toe cap burnished. I happened to not like the burnish so asked a cobbler I know if they could do anything about it. They said they could use a chemical of some sort to remove the burnish but not damage the leather. When I got the shoes back the burnish was removed, but there appeared to be a thin film in the toe cap area making the finish of the toe cap look different than the rest of the shoe. Not sure what the film is but it appears to be dissolving with the use of the Saphir Renovateur. However, this is pretty time consuming. I realize my information is rather vague, but if you are familiar with this sort of situation, is there anything you would reccomend to use instead the Saphir Renovateur to make the toe cap area match the rest of the shoe? Thanks!

What did you think would happen if you treated one part of the shoe and not the whole shoe? My guess is they will never be uniform as they weren't intended to be. EGs burnishing is rather nice and many work hard to preserve it and replicate it on non-EG shoes.

Whilst not likely to help you recover this mess trying to alter the manufacturers intent would be a good lesson to draw for the future. Chemicals rarely have 100% good outcomes, despite theories on the part of those anxious to help.

why you didnt like the burnishing, i don't know.

But to pay someone to remove it is beyond me.

You should understand that to many cobblers, time is money and they simply would choose the quickest rather than the best way out. It is not that difficult to get rid of the burnishing yourself with just saddle soap or a leather cleaner, even though it may take two tries. It appears that your shoe repair guy not only chose to use a stronger solvent but was spot cleaning it as well.

I was willing to take the risk and am not blaming anyone (including myself) for the outcome which by the way really isn't bad. It's just taken me about 2 X 30 min attempts with the Rennovateur to get to about 90% uniformity. I suspect with one or two more applications and some polish they will look pretty good and uniform to the naked eye. Burnish or not - that's just personal preference. What I'm looking for is if there are any suggestions better than my current approach.

Originally Posted by upnorth

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why you didnt like the burnishing, i don't know. But to pay someone to remove it is beyond me. You should understand that to many cobblers, time is money and they simply would choose the quickest rather than the best way out. It is not that difficult to get rid of the burnishing yourself with just saddle soap or a leather cleaner, even though it may take two tries. It appears that your shoe repair guy not only chose to use a stronger solvent but was spot cleaning it as well.

Originally Posted by dreamtripper

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I was willing to take the risk and am not blaming anyone (including myself) for the outcome which by the way really isn't bad. It's just taken me about 2 X 30 min attempts with the Rennovateur to get to about 90% uniformity. I suspect with one or two more applications and some polish they will look pretty good and uniform to the naked eye.

Burnish or not - that's just personal preference. What I'm looking for is if there are any suggestions better than my current approach.

Of course this is after the fact, but what should have been done is to have had the entire shoe stripped, restained to the desired color, and repolished. This would have taken care of the issue of "uniformity" and provided you the quickest resolution of your problem - the dislike for "antiquing."
Anything else now will simply cost more money, should your efforts not produce the desired outcome.

Using a neutral wax polish and wiping would slowly reduce the appearance of the burnish as it acts like a solvent.