PU leather – what is it? reference Information

In recent years, PU leather has been actively used for the production of high-quality goods: clothing and footwear, sports accessories and equipment, all kinds of cases, wallets and toys. Thanks to its excellent high-tech characteristics, this material is becoming increasingly popular among consumers of different categories: from retail to wholesale. Full imitation of the texture of natural leather makes it possible to use this material almost everywhere. Externally, it is practically no different from natural material.

What is pu leather? This is a modern, breathable and environmentally friendly artificial material that can create serious competition with its natural counterpart. Unlike genuine leather, this material:

reliable and wear-resistant;
soft and pleasant to the touch;
does not fade or crack under the influence of adverse environmental influences;
does not deform under heavy loads when used as furniture upholstery or as a material for sports equipment;
does not absorb moisture.

In the civilized world, an increasing number of environmentalists are protesting against the killing of animals and the use of their skins to make various items of clothing and household items. Therefore, many well-known brand manufacturers have found an ideal alternative. The pu leather used received the most positive reviews, because the rich variety of colors, shades and unusual textures and patterns allows the designer to realize his most original ideas and projects.

Following the production of clothing and shoes, others followed. The use of this material to create inexpensive but high-quality items of mass demand became possible because pu leather meets all operational requirements and at the same time has a relatively low price. We have long become accustomed to everyday things: shoes that we put on every day when leaving the house, jackets and raincoats, gloves and bags. In apartments or offices, salons or shops, there are often interior items created using PU leather.

Most manufacturers of upholstered and cabinet furniture use this material in the manufacture of sofas, armchairs and chairs. At the same time, the quality and aesthetic appearance of the finished products satisfy the most demanding customers, since PU leather remains in its original form throughout its entire service life.

This material is used in the production of almost any sports equipment: various balls and gloves, sports shoes, bags and protective shields for athletes.

Now products labeled “pu leather” can be found in almost any category: leather goods, shoes, clothing, furniture, sporting goods, cars.

When buying clothes, accessories and other goods, buyers pay attention to the material from which the product is made. For example, it often says: upper material - PU. What it is, many people don’t know. And then people have doubts about purchasing the new thing they like.

Modern PU material. What is this?

This material is used quite widely and, despite the fact that it appeared recently, is already well known to many for its high quality and has managed to earn popularity. PU leather has a natural base and, what is important for the buyer, is about five times less affordable than natural leather. This material has excellent performance properties, it is very light, machine washable, and does not require further ironing, since it recovers itself after drying when flattened.

PU material. What is it: dermantine or leatherette?

Many people still believe that PU leather is an ordinary leatherette or dermantine. This is a completely erroneous opinion. PVC artificial leather is polyvinyl chloride, a plasticizer and some other components. But the PU material has a completely different base, in addition, it is two times lighter than leatherette. PU, from the English word polyurethane, is comparable in quality to leather, and in some properties even surpasses it. It combines the advantages of both synthetic and natural materials.

It has a top coating of polyurethane, which is the most resistant to stretching and abrasion. The polymer applied to the base of the material provides a number of excellent characteristics: wear resistance, environmental friendliness, absence of cracks and stretching, resistance to low and high temperatures, softness and strength. Thanks to the through pores, it is able to allow air to pass through, which is a very important hygienic indicator. The upper breathable and hygroscopic coating has another important property: it is hypoallergenic.

It is important to know about the PU material, that with a base made of This makes it more resistant to stretching and mechanical stress. The most modern new technologies are used to produce microfibers and polyurethane, which are part of PU.

Production process

PU leather is made using inner layers of natural leather with imperfections that have been processed. The outer polyurethane layer allows painting in any color, drawing and embossing. Eco-leather is also a PU material; this name is also widespread and often found on product labels; it is useful to know when making purchases. The wide opportunities for realizing designers' ideas that eco-leather provides make products made from it relevant and attractive, best suited to changing fashion.

Today, the characteristics of many products indicate: the main materials are PU. Indeed, PU leather is often used in the production of watch straps, cases for mobile phones and other equipment, and women's bags. This fact is easy to explain. The material has a low price and is almost equal in quality and functionality to natural leather.

How many times, while reading product characteristics, have you come across the abbreviation PU leather(PU) or PU leather? This material, despite its young age, has already earned popularity among consumers due to its qualities. And in this article we will figure out what this popular new product is. The first thing to start with is that PU leather is, of course, completely different from what we remember from childhood, like leatherette or leatherette. It combines the advantages of synthetic and natural materials. PU (from the English polyurethane) leather is not inferior in quality even, and in some characteristics it surpasses it.

Thanks to the polymer that is applied to its base, this leather receives a number of useful properties, which gives it such important and undeniable advantages over natural leather:

high wear resistance;
no harmful additives, PU leather is an environmentally friendly material;
has pleasant tactile properties;
leather is more resistant to wear, which gives it an advantage over natural leather;
PU leather does not stretch or crack;
PU leather performs well under the influence of low and high temperatures. In other words, such skin does not become stiff in the cold and does not heat up in the heat.

Polyurethane, among all polymer coatings, is the most resistant to abrasion and stretching. Thanks to the polyurethane coating, the material acquires such important qualities as strength and softness. Unlike genuine leather, polyurethane is more frost-resistant and has the most important characteristic - the ability to “breathe”, thanks to through pores. This feature is associated with high popularity, because these are such recently important hygienic indicators as air permeability, vapor permeability and hygroscopicity.

The basis of PU (PU) leather is cotton fabric, resistant to mechanical stress and stretching. In its production, microfibers and high-quality polyurethane are used, produced using new technologies. We call PU leather eco-leather because it is hypoallergenic.

High-quality PU leather has no odor, and during use it does not stretch or crack. During its manufacture, the inner layers are made from defective leather of natural origin, which has undergone special processing. The outer layer of polyurethane can be given a variety of colors and any pattern, maintaining the qualities of natural leather for air exchange and resistance to deformation, while at the same time giving a special design. That is, thanks to this, PU leather can be given a more attractive appearance than natural leather, which is very important in the rapidly moving world of fashion.

The use of PU leather is explained by the fact that this material is inexpensive compared to natural leather and is almost as good as it in terms of mechanical qualities and functionality. And what can we say about the design possibilities, because this material can be obtained in any color and structure.

All this allows us to produce watch straps at a low price, which is accordingly reflected in the cost of the finished product, while maintaining the high quality of the finished product. Some misconceptions regarding PU leather should also be dispelled.

What is leatherette?

Faux leather contains a woven base, and to produce PU leather, the top layer of inexpensive natural leather is removed, then covered with polyurethane and then embossed.
PU leather and artificial leather (PVC) PVC have nothing in common. The only thing they have in common is that they are polymers.

PVC artificial leather is made from polyvinyl chloride with the addition of a plasticizer and other additional components.

PU leather is almost two times lighter than PVC leather and, as we have already mentioned, has high organoleptic properties.

In conclusion, it should be noted that PU leather is an already proven material that is made on a natural basis. And one of its main advantages for the buyer is, of course, the price. Often the cost is almost five times lower than the same model made from genuine leather, thanks to which you can change clothes, following the latest fashion trends. And, what is so important in the use of accessories and clothing, it is unusually light, products made from PU leather can be washed in a washing machine, and you don’t even need to iron it - you just need to let it hang on a hanger for several hours.

Girls, as the organizer of a shoe joint venture, I’m already, as they say, boiling, the assortment includes natural and artificial ones. Apparently Norad is spoiled by the numerous assortment of CS, etc. They always want to be in trend, so they attack sellers with new words, often without knowing their meaning. It's all very simple though.
So, the materials from which shoes are made. Well, open up America and tell us what genuine leather is and that I won’t use leatherette))
I’ll reveal the secret of the fashionable word PU leather, what foreign stores are full of - America, England, Germany.
So, PU leather is high-tech material of a new generation. Its base is a polymer, and natural leather (usually defective) is usually used as the first and second layers. Thanks to the polymer applied to the base, this leather acquires a number of useful properties, which gives it undeniable advantages over natural leather, such as:
- high wear resistance
- free of harmful additives, PU leather - environmentally friendly
- has pleasant tactile properties
- resistant to wear and tear compared to ordinary leather
— PU leather does not stretch or crack
- resistant to low and high temperatures

And in addition to everything, its production is cheaper than genuine leather. One way or another, if you decide to buy something made of PU leather, you won’t go wrong... The item will serve its owner for a long time and will always bring joy.

And here press leather is what our websites and China are full of.
Sellers, without a shadow of a doubt, characterize it as genuine leather. Not being a specialist, the buyer takes the product in full confidence that he is purchasing good quality shoes. Disappointment sets in quickly - already in the first month of wearing such shoes are covered with a network of cracks, and closer to two months, as a rule, they burst at the folds.

Genuine leather is made from whole hides taken from animals. To obtain finished leather from a hide, it is necessary to carry out about fifty production processes and operations, during which its natural structure is carefully preserved. The result is a durable, wear-resistant material with good hygienic properties. “Pressed leather” is a material produced under pressure from waste from the production of natural leather. This is where the similarities end, but the differences remain.

One of the components used in the production of “pressed leather” is trimmings and scraps, chrome shavings, tanning dust and other waste remaining after the production and cutting of natural and “pressed” leather itself. The second component is synthetic binder fibers. They can be made from any synthetic material: polyester, polyamide, polyethylene... When heated, they melt and stick together. The third component is synthetic thermoplastic resins. They are introduced for additional gluing and strengthening of the fibrous structure.

“Pressed leather” can be compared to artificial leather, which was made 20 - 30 years ago. The use of a significant amount of synthetic resins, which impregnate the entire structure, produces a material with low air and moisture permeability. Studies have been conducted that show reduced strength of “pressed leather”. Its hygienic properties are not even mentioned. So shoes made from “pressed leather” will not last long, and your feet will sweat and “burn” in them.

I was prompted to write this advice by a question from one of my customers today. who asked, are you sure that this is genuine leather, maybe it’s press leather. That is. if you compare skin to candy, and pressed skin to poop. You can figure out what you asked me)))
Those. a person initially thinks that press leather is the same leather only a little cheaper. And there are a lot of them.
I hope now when choosing shoes, not a single unscrupulous seller will be able to sell you poop for the price of candy)))
Good luck and good mood)

Not so long ago, products with previously unknown labels containing 100% PU appeared in stores in our country. Sales consultants, when asked what kind of beast this PU is, are often at a loss themselves. Faux leather, a new type of synthetics, pressed leather, artificial leather, polyurethane leather, even ordinary leather - such answers can often be heard not only in departments at markets, but even in decent stores. However, none of them are correct. So what kind of material is PU (pu leather)?

Let's start with the fact that PU leather is, of course, not at all what we knew from childhood as artificial leather or leatherette. Naturally, PU leather is also not an exact copy of natural leather, although its external characteristics are very similar to it.

The manufacturing process of PU leather is often called high-tech, and the PU material itself is called high-grade. In part, this may be true, because Pu leather is made of several layers. The first (and most important for us as a consumer) is the cotton base. Next is defective genuine leather that has undergone special processing. These first two layers give the main advantage to the PU material over its “grandfather” - leatherette. Namely, breathability, that is, theoretically, PU leather should “breathe.” The last layer is polyurethane, which actually gave the name to this material in the form of the prefix pu - from the English. polyurethane. Polyurethane is, of course, a synthetic material, but it is what makes it possible to create PU leather products in incredible colors, with various patterns and prints that the consumer likes so much.

It is also worth mentioning other properties of pu leather:

frost resistance (for example, down jackets made of PU leather are no longer uncommon in our country);
resistance to mechanical load, elasticity;
super strength (unlike genuine leather, a product made from PU leather is unlikely to ever break);
odorless (which significantly distinguishes it from leatherette);
softness.

Often, in online articles you can see that PU leather is called eco-leather, and they attribute to it the fact that it is a non-allergenic product. However, you should not believe this 100% percent. After all, during the manufacturing process, the manufacturer is free to add whatever he wants to the composition, and it rarely ends up on labels with the composition.

For the same reason, it is worth mentioning those manufacturers who use the inscription 100% PU on products made from simple artificial leather. Therefore, the buyer should pay attention to two main factors: weight and softness. A product made from PU leather should be much lighter and softer than a similar product made from leatherette leather, i.e. in terms of external characteristics, this product should be 80% similar to a product made of genuine leather.

In conclusion, it is worth noting that PU leather is a well-proven material made on a natural basis. And its main advantage over the consumer is, of course, the price. Often it is 4-5 times lower than a similar model made of genuine leather, which gives us the opportunity to change clothes more often, following the latest fashion trends. Also, PU leather is incredibly easy to use, PU products can even be washed in a washing machine, and to get ironed, you just need to let it hang on a hanger for several hours.

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