How to make shoe polish. Shoe creams. Raw materials. Simple recipes DIY shoe polish

This product protects against the negative effects of moisture, dampness, frost or dryness, adds shine and returns the original color. When choosing a cream, the type of material plays a big role.

Which cream to choose

Choose a special product that is designed for suede or artificial leather, suede, nubuck or other material. Experts do not recommend using cream for one material if it is intended for another.

For smooth and patent leather, it is better to choose formulations based on natural beeswax. For suede, sprays with a protective composition are well suited, which must be sprayed at some distance from the surface of the shoe.

For the cold season, choose thick and greasy products based on organic solvents, which create a waterproof film and protect shoes from the negative effects of moisture, wet snow and frost.

Emulsion compositions dissolve well and allow air to pass through, so they are suitable for use in warm and hot weather. Shoes for everyday wear are well protected by a product containing turpentine.

How to use shoe polish correctly

Before treating shoes with cream, the product must be washed and cleaned. Cleaning features also depend on the material. For example, suede should not be wetted under running water, but should be wiped with a soapy solution and ammonia. It is also not recommended to wet most leather and patent leather items too much, but rubber shoes are not afraid of water.

To clean patent leather use special milk. Dry patent leather, suede and leather shoes need at room temperature away from radiators, batteries and heating devices! Otherwise, the leather or suede will crack.

You need to wash your shoes after walking, and not before going outside. Wait for the dirt to dry and then brush off with a soft bristle brush. For suede surfaces, a brush with brass bristles is suitable. Then the products are washed with a damp cloth, wiped with a dry cloth and left to dry. And the already dry, clean shoes are rubbed with cream.

You also need to apply the cream not before going outside, but at least eight hours before. This shoe polish takes about ten hours to absorb.

Only after this does it form a protective waterproof film, which will protect the surface from the negative effects of moisture, dust and dirt. If you apply the composition before going outside in wet weather, it will simply be washed off by rain or in the first puddle.

Experts recommend wiping casual shoes once a week with a soft cloth previously soaked in purified gasoline. You only need to choose dry and clean shoes!

Gasoline will remove stains from the surface and open the pores, which will speed up the absorption of the cream. And after treatment, leather or patent leather shoes can be treated with regular body lotion. It will return the products to their former shine and original color.

To keep the shoe polish for a long time and not dry out, be sure to close the product after use!

What to do if the cream has dried out

If the cream has dried out or you have several jars accumulated, you can revive this product. You can restore dried cream in the following ways:

Many shoe products contain petroleum jelly, so this product can be used to dilute the dried mass. It will not only restore the cream, but also enhance its protective properties;
You can add glycerin or turpentine to the dried cream;
Dried light shoe polish will revive the milk. You need to dilute a few drops of milk in the product. The resulting composition will become soft and effectively protect the shoes. In addition, milk is excellent for treating white or light leather and suede. It paints over scuffs and returns the original color;
Fresh colorless shoe polish is added to the old composition and mixed thoroughly. You will receive a new effective remedy!

If you use milk, petroleum jelly, turpentine or glycine, you need to dissolve a few drops of the chosen product in the old cream. Mix the composition thoroughly and heat it in a water bath in a metal container. Thus, the dried mass will completely restore its previous protective properties. By the way, you can make shoe polish at home.

How to make shoe polish at home

Take 100 grams linseed oil and beef or lamb lard. You will also need 30 grams of beeswax and 20 grams of rosin. Mix the ingredients and melt over the fire, stirring constantly. Heat until mixture is smooth;
Instead of beeswax, you can use 5-10 grams of turpentine. The components are also mixed and heated in a water bath, stirring continuously;
You can use the recipe without rosin. In this case, take 450 grams of linseed oil, 30 grams of lamb or beef lard, and 25 grams of beeswax. The components are mixed and heated until smooth;
Take 200 grams of lamb or beef lard, 100 grams of lard, 50 grams of turpentine and beeswax. Mix and heat the composition in a water bath until smooth.

The cream obtained at home is stored in a glass container under a tightly closed airtight lid at room temperature. You can use the product after it has cooled. For shoes made of expensive and high-quality material, do not use dried or expired cream, even after dilution. Better buy a new product.

In addition to cream, you can use special products for cleaning and washing shoes. As a rule, these are shoe lotions and milk. They also differ in the type of material. For high-quality, reliable care you will need a special cloth and a brush with soft bristles.

A special stain remover for shoes and folk remedies in the form of soda and table salt, vinegar solution, ammonia and hydrogen peroxide. To restore color, spray paints for shoes, drinking milk, and coffee grounds are used.

Protective or water-repellent shoe cream helps extend its service life, and if you don’t trust store-bought creams, you can make it yourself. Several recipes, using which you can make protective shoe polish with your own hands from natural ingredients:

How to make water-repellent shoe polish

The first recipe. 100 grams of linseed oil, 100 grams of lard (lamb or beef), 30 grams of beeswax and 20 grams of pine resin or rosin must be melted, stirring continuously, until a homogeneous mixture is obtained;

The second recipe. In the same way, with continuous stirring, melt 50 grams of linseed oil, the same amount of beef or lamb lard, 5 grams of turpentine and 15 grams of rosin in a water bath or on the stove until smooth;

Recipe three. Again, 30 grams of beef or lamb lard, 25 grams of beeswax and 450 grams of flaxseed oil must be mixed and melted in a water bath until the mixture becomes homogeneous.

The fourth recipe for water-repellent shoe polish. According to this recipe, you need to melt 200 grams of lamb or beef lard, 100 grams of pork lard, 50 grams of vegetable oil, the same amount of beeswax and pine turpentine. This should be done in a water bath.

Shoes should be lubricated with the prepared water-repellent cream after it has cooled, and the cream should be stored in a tightly closed glass container.

How to make water-repellent cream for ski or hunting shoes

Ski and hunting shoes are constantly in contact with snow and water, and you can make a reliable water-repellent cream for shoes of this type using the following recipe:
- over low heat, slowly heat 200 grams of natural drying oil, and then add 20 grams of rubber glue to it, with continuous stirring. Separately from this, melt 20 grams of paraffin and mix everything thoroughly.

Before use, the water-repellent cream prepared in this way is heated by placing it in a vessel with hot water. They lubricate the soles and tops of ski and hunting shoes.

If you need to make a water-repellent cream for shoes that are supposed to be worn in swampy areas, add 100 grams of castor oil to the above ingredients.

We make for shoes

For handicrafts

Leather care product.

To soften the skin, make it waterproof, and prevent it from drying out, mixtures based on wax and other components are prepared. For example, mixtures for shoes and technical products include 6.5 parts of wax, 26.5 parts of lamb fat, 6.5 parts of turpentine and olive oil, 13 parts melted lard and 5 parts soot. The mixture is heated before rubbing into the skin.

How to make water-repellent shoe polish

The second recipe. Again, 30 grams of beef or lamb lard, 25 grams of beeswax and 450 grams of flaxseed oil must be mixed and melted in a water bath until the mixture becomes homogeneous.

Recipe three. According to this recipe, you need to melt 200 grams of lamb or beef lard, 100 grams of pork lard, 50 grams of vegetable oil, the same amount of beeswax and pine turpentine until smooth. This should be done in a water bath. (Shoes should be lubricated with the prepared water-repellent cream after it has cooled, and the cream should be stored in a tightly closed glass container.)

Shoemaker's pitch

Shoe polish consists of rosin, wax, fat, and sulfur. The composition varies depending on the hardness of the rosin. Initially, varnish was made by boiling resin (pine gum). Shoe warp serves not only to protect the thread from damage, but more so that the thread sticks to the material and when individual links break or fray, the seam remains intact! Wax for sealing defects, cuts, etc. There is a ready-made one that can be applied with special irons, but it is very hard and difficult to use when repairing. I make it myself from wax, paraffin, factory wax and a little resin, heat it up and pour it into a paper tube to make a pencil, use it to rub over the chips, rub the cracks with a thick cloth and paint the top with varnish or finishing coat in color!

In general, it’s like this - to fill out defects, you can simply mix wax with paraffin, add resin and factory wax for color, black pigment can be bought on the market, you can use carbon black (carbon black is even better, you can even add it to dismokol and you’ll get NERO SAR)! For thread, it’s also enough to boil wax and rosin, I have electrical liquid rosin, I didn’t add anything to this - it sticks to my hands terribly, I’ll have to buy a stone-like one..

Creams and finishing agents for shoes

Shoe creams.

Creams can be divided into two groups: turpentine and aqueous.

I. Turpentine creams. It must be borne in mind that the production of turpentine creams poses some fire hazards, especially when open fire is used. There should always be a lid under the worker’s hands to tightly close the pan in case the turpentine catches fire. There should always be a worker under his feet old carpet in order to extinguish the fire in time. Eyes should be protected with goggles. Smoking or lighting matches in the room where turpentine is being worked is not allowed. In case of burns, you should always have bicarbonate of soda on hand, which is applied in a thick layer to the burn; The work does not require special utensils: a cast-iron enameled cauldron with a lid is sufficient. You should have separate dishes for different colors of cream. It is also necessary to have a Celsius thermometer, i.e. with divisions from 0 to 100*. The required amount of oleic acid is poured into the cauldron (see below) and the required amount of aniline dye (black or colored), soluble in fats, is dissolved in it. When the paint has dissolved, put the strained mixture of waxes into the cauldron and, stirring, melt, while monitoring with a thermometer so that the temperature of the molten mass does not rise above 95 * and does not fall below 90 * C. Then, if melting occurs on a primus stove, then, Having previously extinguished the fire, add the required amount of turpentine in a thin stream, stirring thoroughly all the time. If melting occurred on the stove, then you need to remove the boiler from the stove.
The temperature of the mass should be such that after adding turpentine it is not lower than 40 * and not higher than 50 * C. It is necessary to ensure that the temperature of the mixture is not lower than 40°C, since such a mass, poured into cans, will not have a good pattern. Warming up the cooled mixture will not improve the situation, and therefore you need to first find out on a small test what the temperature will be after adding turpentine, and in certain cases (especially in winter) it is better to warm up the turpentine by placing the bottle in hot water. The turpentine temperature should be about 20-30* C in winter, and 10-15* C in summer.
Turpentine cream is usually poured into jars or flat tins. The lids of both must be tightly fitted so that the turpentine cannot evaporate. In handicraft workshops they usually pour using a small saucepan with a spout, in large productions - with special bottling machines. To prevent the cream from cooling below 40*C during operation, place the pan with the cream in a bowl of hot water (50|C). The room temperature should be about 15*, then the cooling of the cream in the tins is better and a more beautiful surface of the cream is obtained.
Some varieties of cream have a characteristic pattern in the form of ring-shaped or zigzag lines running from the edges of the tin to the center. They are formed only if the creams contain materials best quality, such as carnauba wax. Even a small amount of carnauba wax in the ointment can cause this characteristic pattern on the surface of the cream. For this purpose, arrange a flow of air to the cream poured into tins, fanning the ointment with a fan.
Below are several recipes for turpentine creams. It depends on the experience of the master to choose such a mixture of waxes in order to obtain the best quality and at the same time the cheapest ointment.
Here are some tried and tested recipes for turpentine shoe polishes:
... 2) 5 parts carnauba wax, 5 parts yellow beeswax, 5 parts Japanese wax, 17 parts paraffin, 68 parts turpentine, 1.5 parts oleic or stearic acid, 1 part aniline dye.

II. Aqueous creams differ from turpentine creams in that the solvent in them is not turpentine, but water. When preparing aqueous creams for saponification of waxes, potash is used. To prepare aqueous ointments in an artisanal way, no special utensils are required. You can work in an ordinary enamel boiler on a primus stove or on a stove. Since this method does not use turpentine, the work is completely safe in terms of fire.
Place the wax mixture into the cauldron and melt it, stirring thoroughly. To prevent the wax from burning, the temperature should not be higher than 95| C. A 10% solution of potash is poured into another cauldron and, when the dissolved potash boils, it is gradually added to the molten wax thoroughly, stirring. If you pour in a lot of potash at once, a lot of foam will rise in the boiler, which can come out over the edge. In this case, you should spray it with water and the foam will quickly settle. The mixture is heated until it becomes homogeneous. In the remaining water, which must be added to the wax, aniline dye, soluble in water, is dissolved. Finally, the paint solution is added to the hot, washed-off wax, mixed thoroughly and poured into tin boxes.
Here are two tried and tested recipes for water creams;
1) 4 parts carnauba or shellac wax, 16 parts beeswax, 3 parts potash, 4 parts aniline dye, 100 parts water.
2) 16 parts carnauba wax, 6 parts Japanese wax, 3.5 parts potash, 4 parts aniline dye, 120 parts water.

Water-based shoe polishes are much cheaper than turpentine ones, and their preparation is much safer in terms of fire safety. Well-prepared aqueous creams are just as good for cleaning shoes as turpentine creams. They also have the advantage that they do not smell of turpentine.

III. Mixed creams. There is also a third type of cream - mixed creams, which are wax saponified with potash, then diluted with turpentine.
Here is the recipe for such a cream.
4 parts carnauba wax; 16 parts beeswax, 3 parts potash, 2 parts aniline dye, 60 parts water, 30 parts turpentine.

Finish for shoes.

Finishing replaces cream and differs from the latter in that to obtain shine, after spreading it, no rubbing with a brush is required.
Yellow finishing. Take 2 parts yellow wax, 1 part stearin, 1 part linseed oil, melt in a water bath, add 6 parts turpentine, 1 part yellow golden ocher. At the same time, dissolve 1 part of solid soap in 10 parts of water and, with constant stirring, mix this solution with the above mixture until a uniform mass is obtained, to which 8 parts of water are gradually added. After the mass has cooled, it is filled into wide-necked bottles.

Making leather waterproof.

To make the skin waterproof, use liquid and solid fats, which are consumed either separately or mixed with each other. They must satisfy the following requirements: penetrate as deeply as possible into the skin, make the latter flexible and soft, and not impart any undesirable characteristics to it. For such ointments, which impart impermeability to the skin, all vegetable and animal fats and oils that have a weak acid reaction are suitable, and various types wax with and without the addition of resin. Drying oils, although mentioned in many recipes for a similar purpose, should be avoided as they make the skin hard and brittle over time. There is no benefit to consuming glycerin as it is extracted from the skin by water. Mineral oils are also not suitable. Over time, the skin's impermeability is lost due to the action of water, so lubrication should be repeated from time to time. We offer the following product to make the skin impenetrable. Dissolve yellow beeswax in gasoline until saturated, heat the solution in a water bath and add 1/10 of melted spermaceti to it. The frozen mass is stored in jars and used as follows; Having melted in a water bath, it is applied to the skin using a brush or brush. The skin should be dry and slightly warm. The ointment penetrates deep into the skin and, in addition, forms a thin layer on its surface. The latter does not at all interfere with cleaning with cream.

Here's more good composition to make shoes waterproof. Take 1/4 liter of linseed oil and, heating it over low heat, dissolve 50 g of lard, 5 g of wax, 5 g of tree resin in it. Thoroughly lubricate the shoes with this slightly heated mixture. This makes the skin not only very soft and flexible, but also completely impenetrable to water.

For handicrafts

Alika Lazareva

Factory-made cream is not always suitable for shoes, besides, we don’t even know what it is made from, sometimes such products only harm your favorite shoes or boots. What should I do? Let's learn how to make your own shoe polish with your own hands!

Making wax cream

If you want to see shine on your shoes, the right choice will be a quality product based on beeswax. To prepare it, you will need beeswax or paraffin and turpentine. It is better to use beeswax, then your shoes, boots or shoes will have an amazing shine.

Grate the wax, take three tablespoons of it and melt over low heat, placing it in a metal container. Heat separately in hot water½ cup of turpentine, taking it in liquid form. Remember: heating turpentine over an open fire is dangerous, as this substance ignites easily.

Slowly pour the melted wax or paraffin into the warm turpentine, stirring constantly. You will end up with a homogeneous mass, which will harden after cooling; this is homemade shoe polish.

If you need a shoe care product of a certain color, add just a little of the colored oil paint of your choice to the still uncured mixture of beeswax and turpentine. The prepared beeswax cream should be stored in a jar with a tight-fitting lid.

How to make black cream

You can use another method of preparing shoe polish yourself.

To do this, prepare the following components:

25 grams of wax and paraffin;
eight grams of rosin;
soot;
130 g turpentine.

Prepare the cream in a metal container. To obtain a high-quality leather shoe care product, it is better to use natural beeswax. If you can't find rosin, you can replace it with pine resin. Use a kitchen scale to accurately measure the amount of each ingredient needed.

Place wax, paraffin and rosin in a prepared container and place over moderate heat. When the cream components begin to melt, they must be continuously stirred with a wooden spatula. After everything has melted, remove the container from the stove, measure out 130 g of turpentine, add to these ingredients, mix, add soot to them.

To cool the resulting mixture, expose it to open air. When the prepared product has cooled completely, you will have ready-made shoe cream with your own hands in a rich black color. Transfer it to a container convenient for frequent use, which must be tightly closed with a lid, otherwise the product you have prepared will dry out quickly.

Water repellent cream

To protect your shoes from the harmful effects of the environment, and thus extend the life of your favorite shoes, boots or boots, use a protective or water-repellent shoe cream.

There are several recipes that allow you to prepare a water-repellent shoe care product at home.

Recipe 1

Take 100 g of lamb or pork lard, 30 g of beeswax, 20 g of pine resin or rosin. Place all ingredients in a metal container and melt in a water bath, stirring all the time until the mixture is homogeneous. When it cools down, it can be used to care for shoes.

Recipe 2

In the same way, in a water bath or over low heat, you need to melt 50 g of linseed oil and lamb lard, 5 grams of turpentine and 15 g of rosin. Cool at room temperature or place outside.

Recipe 3

Take 100 g of pork and lamb lard, 50 grams of vegetable oil, turpentine and beeswax. Place in a metal bowl and melt over heat until smooth.

A water-repellent cream made using one of these simple recipes will be a good substitute for the products sold in stores. This way you'll know what you're putting on your shoes or boots without worrying about damaging the leather.

If you are afraid that your boots may get wet in rainy weather, do this: soak your leather shoes for a day in a solution of sulfur soap taken in large quantities. After drying, your boots will become softer and will not allow moisture to pass through, even if you have to walk in the rain. To consolidate the result, lubricate the boots with water-repellent cream.

Protecting ski and hunting boots

People who are interested in skiing or hunting certainly have special clothes and shoes for these activities. To keep skiers and hunters' feet always dry, they must protect their boots from getting wet.

Heat 200 g of natural drying oil over moderate heat, add 20 grams of rubber glue to it, stirring constantly.

Due to certain circumstances, industrial shoe polish is not always suitable for your favorite shoes or ankle boots. However, it is still necessary to care for them. In such a situation, beeswax for shoes will come in handy. It makes excellent shoe care products, and the naturalness of such creams is also pleasing. Your shoes will definitely say “thank you” for such care.

Wax is a product of bee activity, which is a yellowish-brown solid mass with a characteristic honey aroma. Prepared from wax and other ingredients, the cream has several very useful qualities:

repels moisture, preventing it from penetrating deep into the shoes, which is why a product soaked in this product will remain dry even in rainy or snowy weather;
prevents cracking of the skin, its drying out (in hot weather) or “stiffening” (in cold weather), the appearance unpleasant odors and salt stains;
smoothes the surface of the product, penetrating and filling small cracks, scratches and other mechanical damage. Additionally, the cream gives a natural shine to the skin;
is distinguished by its versatility, since it is used to care for both footwear and genuine leather, and from leatherette. Also, colorless shoe polish is suitable for products of any shade.

Unfortunately, this versatility does not extend to other non-leather materials. Therefore, wax cream is not recommended for use if shoes are made of nubuck, suede and fabric materials.