Yes! My leather painting was successful! My American Duchess Astorias are now a lovely shade of ivory–hard to notice the difference now that they are painted, but compare the two shoes in the picture below. Can you see the difference? I certainly can. I still need to move the buttons so that the straps do not gap, but half of my plan is complete! Only a few days left for me to do that before I wear them…
This link contains an affiliate code, which provides a small benefit to my shoe fund. This does not affect my impressions and reviews of this product.
Right: Painted ivory to match the fabric at the bottom of the picture
How did I go about painting them? Well, as I mentioned in my last post, I bought Angelus Leather Paint in three colors: yellow, white, and champagne. Technically, ivory is a very small amount of yellow diluted with mounds of white, but when I went to order the paint I had a great gut reaction thought that the champagne might make a better ivory than the yellow. It turns out that the yellow was just too strong! I made a little swatch card (so I could find the right shade of ivory, see what the shades looked like when dry, and so I could repeat the color if I needed to mix more paint). I tried the yellow first, and just one drop of yellow in a fair amount of white made a light yellow color, not at all similar to ivory!
So back to paint mixing: I next tried the champagne. I kept adding more drops of the champagne color to the white to see what depth of shade I would want.
White toe of the Astoria, bottom left: unpainted
My swatch card, right side: with an arrow at the shade I like
Then on to the painting! The Angelus paint worked wonderfully. I did two coats: a light first coat and then a second coat to blend away all the brush strokes and even out the color. I thought about mixing my paint with a little water, but actually liked the consistency straight out of the bottle. I had no trouble getting smooth looking paint after the two coats I applied.
As I said, the change is not drastic, but it is noticeable. The shoes no longer glare white at me. Yay! Here’s a final picture of my whole swatch card with the newly painted ivory Astoria!
The Quintessential Clothes Pen 
Good job, Quinn! I can see the difference, subtle, but definitely there. As much time and effort as you put into the garment I can see why you go the extra mile to make sure the accessories measure up.
One question: where do you purchase Angelus leather paint? I don’t have a project in mind now, but one never knows….
I bought the Angelus Leather Paint at Dharma Trading (www.dharamtrading.com). They are in California, but they ship very quickly and for a reasonable cost. I highly recommend them!
I’m so glad you can see the subtle difference! That is a fabulous way to explain what I was aiming for. It does affect the final look when one takes time on the accessories as well as the garments. 🙂 Thanks!
Uber cool, Quinn. Enjoyed your narrative as well. Big hugs. ~ Mom
Dear Quinn,
Good work, and you saved me a bunch of experimentation, too. My Astorias are also very white and I was just not sure how to handle that situation.
Thanks again,
Natalie
Ooo! I’m so glad you will be able to use this information for your Astorias! I’ll look forward to seeing pictures of them at some point in the future. Thanks for commenting!