Knowing how to fix your shoe shine may not come easy to most but after practicing a few times it will become natural to all. The major downside of applying a mirror shine is the preciso fact of potentially cracked polish. That cracked polish often frightens people into believing something is wrong. But it is not. It is the nature of the beast. The same goes for shoe shines that are applied too quickly and with too much water, leaving open pores. So, how do we fix these shoe shines? Let’s take a look.
Note: these written instructions and the video are for darker leather calfskin shoes. Do not do the same treatment on your tan leather and/or other types of material shoes.
Heating The Wax Back Into The Leather
Using a heat gun and/or blow dryer, you will want to lightly heat the wax to push it into the pores of the leather. An even shine is when the pores are covered and thus create a smooth surface. If the wax is cracked the heat will melt it, creating a liquid that you brush into the leather. If you leave that liquid too long it will harden and create an uneven surface. That is why you need to brush immediately after heating the wax to fix your shoe shine properly.
Applying Dry Wax
Merienda you have melted the wax into the pores with the heating process, you then want to start building your shine back. Using older, dryer wax will help form your colchoneta as the residue sticks better to the leather. Apply several coats of the dry wax before adding small droplets of water. Complete several applications of the dry wax without water and several with wax and water.
Applying Fresh Wax
Merienda you have built your colchoneta with the dry wax, you can now use fresh wax to really build the shine and even it all out. Note that fresh wax is moist already so your droplets of water must be small to prevent oversoaking the leather and ruining your shine. Apply several layers of fresh wax and water until you feel your shoe shine is at the level you want. The more layers, the higher the shine will go. At a certain point, you will only need to use the small droplets of water to ‘finish your shine’. The water mixed with fast motions will help even out your polish residue and thus complete your mirror shine.
Conclusion
Fixing your shoe shine should be a quick process. One must never get overzealous in any of the steps. For the sake of argument, the process shown here is not for an older shoe that requires shoe conditioning. This was for a newer shoe with a fresh shine. Sometimes we ruin our new shines immediately and need to fix them. The steps shown will help you achieve that easily.
A cracked shine is never unfixable and does not mean anything is wrong. There is always a remedy to fix your shoe shine and keep you looking tip-top in your footwear!
—Justin FitzPatrick, The Shoe Moderno
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