Some folks oil and wax finish the Veg-tanned stuff, but it does not seem to possess the natural skin characteristics of full-aniline, such as when you scratch it, the scratch rubs away. My initial thought was that rejuvenating quality of full-aniline is because it is a true full-grain hide, and veg-tanned leather may not be, but I don't really know.
You are talking about two different tanning methods thus the differences - one could say that true vegtan is in fact more natural due to it's use of all natural materials when being tanned - neither is better per se - it's all in the end purpose. You also have other methods such as chamois or braintan - both of which have had the outer grain removed (without great loss of strength) and are true oil/aldehydes tanning methods leaving a hide that is like fine velvet when finished properly.
A mis-conception: Full grain leather is nothing more nor less than leather which still has the outer epidermis left on it rather than having it split off or buffed/sanded, the term by itself in fact has no real bearing on quality. Even most patterned leathers such as oak grain or Morocco are full grain - it's just that they have a pattern/finish applied or produced by various methods, such as folding or boarding - confusing I know since a lot of the info regarding leather, and in particular upholstery leather, is a bit of advertising hype and even at times down right mis-information.
If it's a true scratch - a tearing of the surface - it will never completely rub away - on pull-up leather, which is just one type of full-aniline finish, it appears to do that becuase of the oil content, but so so will harness vegtan - it's all in the difference in how they have been "finished". Tooling vegtan is generally left "drier" so it will take and hold the tooling, but a properly applied oil finish will achieve much the same thing.
Even if its not cracked, it looks like cracking leather to me, which is a sign of really old or poor quality leather
With respect that's another mis-conception: even the finest veg/bark tan can be cracked when stressed (just like good steel - over stress it or stress it in the wrong way and it will fail which is not the steel's nor the leather's fault) - again it's all in the way the particular leather is finished.
FWIW - finishing is something of a mis-nomer the process is technically known as currying which is the work of infusing the leather with fats, oil, waxes, dyes, etc by various means and then they are worked to soften/finish them - amounts and types of oils, etc and working are dependent on the leathers intended end purpose and look desired. In the case pictured above it looks more like the surface crazing you often get with a wax based finish - it's not necessarily the leather itself that has crazed but rather the applied wax finish.
Wild Rose, do you know why would the hides of those animals would be full-aniline treated? With cows, it is the best hides that are full-aniline treated, while the rest goes down the food chain all the way to pigmented leather and NuBuck. Why would the hides of those animals be any different?
The info about only the top 5% being used is part of the hype (when applied to leather in general and not just upholstery hides) and is referring ONLY to upholstery leather which is most often tanned in full-sides rather than in half hides aka sides because in the case of upholstery leather, clean, blemish free surfaces in large pieces are required.
In all types of leather the best grade is determined by how free of surface blemishes the leather is, it has NOTHING to do with the structural quality of the actual hide itself - grade C is just as strong, etc. as grade A - just that grade A is virtually blemish free, while C has range marks, brands, etc. Due to those blemishes, the surface is then often corrected in order to minimize them - but it's a cosmetic fix, not a structural quality issue fix.
Full-aniline (cowhide and others such as buckskin) is also used for high quality handbags and shoes, attache and brief cases, etc. (think Gucci and I've used a fair amount over the years producing such items). Because the size of the pieces needed for the end product is smaller than for upholstery, the smaller sides are then able to be used which gives a much larger selection of raw materials to work from i.e. one half of a full hide may have marks while the other may not have any of few - thus the whole is inappropriate for the top quality, but the one side is - still a fairly small percentage f sides are blemish free, but to repeat grading has to due with cosmetic appearance and not strutural quality. Most blemish free hides come from dairy animals (generally more pampered) rather than beef animals (often range bred and raised), this in in part is one reason for the smaller amounts of blemish free hides being available.
In the case of buckskin, elk hide, etc, they are almost always full hides and a full-aniline treatment is the best way to finish them, especially since they are smaller and many more can be put in the tumblers at one, making the method more cost effective - both elk and deer are also much softer to the hand than even the finest cowhide due to their basic structure when compared to the denser structure of cowhide (you do not find bucksin or elk hide corrected at all, due to their structure). One thing with elk/deer most will have some damage, but since the end product is usually a smaller, high dollar item than furniture, then the extra waste is not as critical
Looking at info regarding only cowhide upholstery leather is leading at least in part to your confusion - for instance Tandy/LF sells what they call blacksmith sides - a nice chestnut color pull-up cow hide leather - twist, bend, or stretch if and you get the same light/dark textures as natural pull-up, whihc is just one "color" of pullup (actually most natural raw and just dried hide is a yellowish brown - nothing like we invision natural hide color to be).
Remember pull-up is just one finish for chrome tanned/full-aniline hides - it may or may not be colored, but will have that "look" due to the oil content which can be reproduced in even vegtan when the proper oiling is done (not all vegtan is hard/stiff).
Comparing vegtan to chrome tanned/full-aniline to buckskin/elk hide is IMO comparing apples and oranges - again none is necessarily better - it's a matter of choosing the right leather for the job and even amongst the different leathers there are variations of type and finish based on the end product. Quality leather comes in many types - the rest is based on our own preferences/prejudices of what is "best".
