Jason I've used several products over the years that I have absolute confidence in reccomending to customers.
Cleaning: Really nothing beats some warm soapy water. I just use a little Dawn dish soap in the water. This takes care of dirt, dust mud etc. The water does not hurt the leather as long as you condition it afterwards. Its also important that you get the leather equally wet all over. I just use a wrung out rag in warm soapy water. I'll follow that by a clear water rinse with another wrung out rag. Now I can't speak to exotic leathers, no experience, but this is how I care for my saddles.
Conditioning: This is big. I genraly caution against oils or liquid conditioners. Not because they don't work but because its too easy for the customer to apply too much. I much prefer creams and pastes. While I don't have any experience with Montana Pitch it has an excellent reputation in the cowboy grapevine. I use Skidmores, RW Williams or Oakwood. Beeswax is an important ingrediant in all 3. Skidmores is made here in the US and the other two are Australian. Ya couldn't get Williams for a while but its around again and a buddy gave me a couple of cans for my birthday. All 3 are pretty much used the same. Apply to your leather, wipe off excess, let sit for afew hours (I'll usually do overnight) and then buff with a clean rag. That last step is important and often over looked by folks. If ya just apply conditioner, wipe off the excess and then going to using whatever you just conditioned they become dirt magnets. Must allow to sit and then buff. This conditionning step is absolutely vital to the life of the leather.First pair of custom boots I ordered were from an old cranky guy that made absolutely superb boots. While he was measuring me I was asking him how to care for them becuase they were expensive and as a rancher/cowboy I'm pretty hard on em. I was asking about specific brands of conditioners and he said he didn't care as long as ya put something on em. He literally said I don't care if ya put Vaseline on em as long as you put something on em. I did and those boots have a gillion horseback miles on em. They've been resoled problay 10 or 12 times and re heeled more. They still clean up nice and are my going to town boots. Another boot story. I'm on my first tub of this Oakwood stuff. Got it from Weaver. I've been very impressed with it so far. I've been using it on things including my kicking around boots. Recently we were out at the ranch and noticed one of the water troughs was over flowing. So my partner and I gather up tools and go to plumbing. We're standing in about 8 inches of standing water fixing the cow crunched supply line. About 10 minutes or so we got er whipped. We wade back to dry land. His boots are sponges and my feet are dry. I'd conditioned those boots couple of days prior as described. I was immpressed. This bears further investigation.
Sealant: I use Bagkote when I make an item and then thats it. I don't recommend people putting finish on. They don't need too. Also there is always a lot of talk about which finish is the the most waterproof, bombproof etc. I think folks miss the point. I WANT my customers to be able to put conditioner on a product. If they can't, it'll crack and its dead. I use BagKote because it makes leather look like leather not plastic and when its time you can put conditioner on. Hope all this helps
