Guide · upholstery in Melbourne
A sticky leather couch is a failing polyurethane topcoat and no cleaner brings it back. Cracking is dried-out pigmented leather, which can be filled and recoloured while the hide still bends. Cat scratches on pigmented leather can be recoloured; on aniline they cannot be hidden. A recolour is a 3 to 5 year fix. Sticky PU or bonded lounges, peeling lounges and badly clawed aniline need a recover.
Last updated: October 2026
Get a free quoteCall 0425 832 619Leather faults sort into bins by finish, not by how bad they look. A pigmented hide can be cleaned, filled and recoloured. An aniline hide shows every claw mark and cannot be hidden. A sticky or flaking PU or bonded couch is terminal and needs a recover. We can tell your bin from two clear photos.
Of the leather lounges that reach our Eltham North bench, roughly seven in ten are pigmented: a real hide under a sprayed colour coat and a clear topcoat. About two in ten are PU or bonded, and barely one in ten is true aniline, dyed through with nothing on top so grain and scars show. PU and bonded leather are a plastic film on a fabric backing; the peeling leather couch page has the home test.
| Finish | How to tell | Scratches | Goes sticky? | Repair path |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aniline | Grain and scars visible, water darkens it in seconds | Pale lines, cannot be hidden | Rarely, product build-up only | Condition and accept patina, or recover |
| Semi-aniline | Light sheen, water darkens slowly | Partly hide with balm and tint | Rarely | Light recolour, or recover |
| Pigmented | Even colour, water beads, no scars | Fill and recolour well | Only if the topcoat has failed | Clean, fill, recolour: 3 to 5 years |
| PU or bonded | Flakes, fabric backing at any cut, feels plasticky | Every scratch becomes a peel site | Yes, 5 to 10 years in | Recover, nothing else lasts |
Our line to every caller: tell me the finish and I will tell you the fix; the damage itself is the least important part of the photo.
A sticky or tacky leather couch almost always means the polyurethane topcoat is breaking down. Polyurethane absorbs moisture and slowly reverts to a gummy state, a process called hydrolysis. It starts 5 to 10 years in, shows on arms and seat fronts first, and no cleaning reverses it, because the sticky layer is the finish itself.
Every sticky lounge that reaches our Eltham North bench has already been scrubbed. Eucalyptus oil, vinegar and baby wipes strip what is left of the clear coat, and silicone conditioner adds a second sticky film.
Conditioner build-up on genuine leather can mimic it. Test a hidden corner with a damp cloth and a drop of mild soap: build-up lifts and dries within a minute, while a failing topcoat stays tacky and leaves colour on the cloth.
Our position is plain: sticky polyurethane on a PU or bonded couch is a terminal fault, and the fix is a recover, not a product off a shelf. For a sticky PU lounge we usually recommend Austex commercial-grade vinyl: the leather look without the coating that failed. A genuine pigmented hide that is still supple is the one sticky case worth saving: its failed clear coat can be stripped back and refinished as part of a recolour. We confirm which you have from the photos when we quote.
Cracking and peeling look similar in a photo and mean opposite things. Cracking is a web of fine lines in the colour coat of dried-out pigmented leather, with the hide still bending underneath. Peeling is a plastic film lifting from a fabric backing. Cracked pigmented leather can be filled and recoloured; peeling cannot be repaired to last.
The bench test takes ten seconds. Fold a cracked area gently: if the base of each line matches the surface colour and nothing flakes, only the finish has given up. If pale fibre or a woven backing shows, or a corner lifts like a sticker, that is peeling.
If the hide is still supple, the fix is cleaning, conditioning, crack filling and a recolour. If the cracks have gone through so the hide feels like cardboard and splits when folded, no filler holds and a recover is the honest answer.
The line we repeat on quotes: cracks in the finish are cosmetic, cracks in the hide are structural, and a fingernail tells you which in a second.
Cat scratches on a pigmented leather couch can be repaired: the lifted fibres are trimmed flush, the scratches filled, and the area recoloured and sealed. Cat scratches on aniline leather cannot be hidden, because the pale line is raw hide, not a damaged coating. Scratches on faux leather pierce the film and become the first peel sites.
A claw on pigmented leather lifts a fine curl of colour coat and a few grain fibres. A proper repair shaves those curls flush, works a flexible filler into anything deeper, then builds the colour back in thin coats under a sealer; done well it disappears at normal viewing distance and holds 3 to 5 years. Nine times out of ten the claw marks sit on arm corners and the back edge.
On aniline the claw opens the fibre and the pale line is the inside of the hide; a tinted balm darkens it, and most aniline owners learn to read the marks as patina. Anyone promising to make them vanish is promising to turn your aniline into painted leather.
Faux leather is the worst case: each claw mark breaks the film and within months becomes a lifting edge. A clawed faux lounge with a sound frame gets recovered, in a tight-weave fabric at 30,000 Martindale or more, or a vinyl, which claws cannot snag.
Fading is ultraviolet light breaking down the colour coat on the window side. Dark, shiny headrests and arms are the opposite problem: body oils, sweat and hair product soaking in and softening the finish. Both respond to a recolour, but only after degreasing, and only when the oil has not gone through the hide.
A faded lounge is one of the better recolour candidates because its surface is usually sound. The trap is recolouring only the faded side: a lounge tan in the shade and honey at the window needs the whole piece brought to one colour.
Headrests darken because the finish absorbs oil from skin and hair. Ask whether the panel will be degreased first, sometimes over two or three passes, because a recolour over oil fails inside a year. If the panel stays dark and soft after degreasing, the oil is in the hide and that panel is replaced, not painted.
Our view: a dark headrest is an oil problem wearing a colour problem's clothes.
A leather recolour degreases the hide, abrades the old finish, fills cracks and scratches, then rebuilds the colour in thin coats under a new topcoat. It fixes fading, finish cracking, pigmented-leather scratches and colour changes. On a family lounge it is a 3 to 5 year fix, and a careful workshop will say so before you spend anything.
The new finish is thinner than the factory one and sits on a hide that has lost oils, so it wears faster at seat fronts and arms. A formal-room lounge can look right for 7 or 8 years; a three-seater carrying a family nightly is nearer 3. Cost drivers are area, surface prep, any colour change, how much panel replacement is involved and any surprises found once the piece is open.
A panel recover is smarter when one panel has failed and the rest are sound: an oil-soaked headrest or a split seat front. Leather is sold by the whole hide, around 5 square metres, not by the metre, so one seat panel can mean buying a full hide. The leather versus vinyl guide explains that arithmetic; it is why three failed panels usually means a full recover.
A recolour buys a sound lounge a few more years; it never buys a tired one a new life.
Recover, do not repair, when the fault is in the material rather than the finish: sticky or peeling polyurethane, cracks through the hide, clawed aniline across more than one panel, or oil soaked through the headrests. Recover too when the foam and springs have gone, because a recolour over a flat seat is money on the wrong layer.
When we open a 10 to 15 year old leather lounge, the leather is often the third problem: soft seat foam, stretched webbing, and a cover that has followed the collapse. A recolour there fixes the surface and leaves the sag, so we check the platform first. The sagging sofa page covers those checks; a recover is the one time foam, springs and webbing are all renewed with the cover off: Dunlop HR35 foam at 200 firm for seats, under its 10-year Dunlop warranty, and 9-way hand-tied springs where the piece suits them.
A recover only makes sense on a frame worth keeping: hardwood with sound joints carries our 30-year frame guarantee; stapled particleboard does not justify new hides. The cover is genuine leather, Austex vinyl or quality Australian and imported fabrics. Turnaround is about a couple of weeks once the material is in; the material lead time is the part we cannot promise.
The test we apply before quoting: if the fix would outlast the rest of the lounge, repair it; if the rest of the lounge would outlast the fix, recover it.
Good to know
A sticky leather couch nearly always has a failing polyurethane topcoat, which absorbs moisture and slowly turns gummy after 5 to 10 years, starting on arms and seat fronts. Cleaners and conditioners make it worse. On PU or bonded leather the only lasting fix is a recover; on a genuine pigmented hide that is still supple, the failed topcoat can be stripped back and refinished as part of a recolour. Conditioner build-up on real leather is different: it wipes dry with mild soap and water on a test corner.
Cracking is a web of fine lines in the finish of genuine pigmented leather and can be filled and recoloured; peeling is a plastic film lifting off a fabric backing and cannot be repaired to last, so the difference decides the whole job. Cracked hide still bends underneath the lines; peeling PU or bonded leather lifts like a sticker. Fold the area gently: same colour at the base of the lines means cracking, pale fibre or backing means peeling.
On pigmented leather, yes. The lifted fibres are trimmed flush, deeper marks are filled, and the area is recoloured and sealed, which disappears at normal viewing distance and lasts 3 to 5 years. On aniline leather, no. The pale lines are the raw hide showing through dye, and they can be darkened with a tinted balm but never hidden without painting the whole surface, which changes the leather's character permanently.
Not in a way that lasts. A claw mark on PU or bonded leather breaks the plastic film, and every scratch becomes the start of a peel as moisture gets under it. Paints and patch kits do not bond to a failing film. If the frame is sound, the lounge is recovered, usually in a commercial-grade vinyl or a tight-weave fabric at 30,000 Martindale or more, which claws cannot snag.
Yes, if it is genuine pigmented or semi-aniline leather with the hide still supple. A recolour degreases, abrades, fills and rebuilds the colour in thin coats under a new topcoat. On a family lounge it is a 3 to 5 year fix, longer in a formal room, shorter with dogs and nightly use. It is not a forever fix, and anyone who tells you otherwise has not watched one wear.
On pigmented leather, yes, and fading is one of the best recolour candidates because the surface is usually sound. The whole lounge is brought back to one colour; the faded side cannot be matched on its own. On aniline leather a sun-faded panel cannot be restored without converting the finish to a pigmented one. Keeping the lounge out of direct sun afterwards noticeably extends how long the new colour holds.
Body oils, sweat and hair product soak into the finish exactly where heads and forearms rest. The oil softens the topcoat until it turns glossy and slightly tacky, then dirt bonds to it. The fix is a proper degreasing, often two or three applications, followed by a recolour. If the panel stays dark and soft after degreasing, the oil has gone through the hide and that panel is replaced rather than recoloured.
A cut shorter than a thumbnail on pigmented leather can be sub-patched, filled, textured and recoloured by a leather technician so it is hard to find. Anything longer, on a seat that flexes every day, reopens within months, and the honest recommendation is to replace that panel instead. On aniline leather, a repair will always show as a smoother patch. We tell you from the photo which route we would take before you spend anything.
Because a new hide is matched to a sample card, while the old panels have had years of light, oil and wear. The new panel looks right for the first month, then sits noticeably fresher as the old ones keep ageing. Leather is also sold by the whole hide, around 5 square metres, so one panel can mean buying a full hide. We usually suggest replacing the full seat set or recolouring the whole piece.
Yes, going darker is the easiest colour change on pigmented leather, and black over brown covers in fewer coats than most changes. Going lighter is harder: tan over black needs a blocking coat and the result wears thinner. The couch must be genuine leather with a sound surface, since colour will not bond to a peeling coating or to a sticky one that has not been stripped back first. Expect the same 3 to 5 year life as any recolour.
The seat front is where the leather folds hardest and most often, where knees and calves rub it, and where it faces the room and the window. It also has the least foam behind it, so the hide stretches tight over the rail. Finish cracking there is cosmetic and can be filled and recoloured. If the seat front has split through, the cushion platform underneath has usually collapsed too, which is why we check the foam and webbing before quoting a cosmetic repair.
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