Materials for Surface Design and Finishing for Contemporary Footwear – Part 1

The leather industry creates a product that is both natural and long lasting. Leather is unique in its ability to combine beauty, comfort and practicality. Finishing, the last operation in natural leather processing, determines the appearance and value of the finished product, and has the purpose of embellishment, providing lustre and pleasant feel, covering flaws and forming a surface layer that protects leather during wear while improving resistance to external factors. The quality of the pigment pastes used in the composition of the leather surface finishing films influences some of the physical-mechanical, technological and aesthetic properties of the finished products. The materials for finishing – pigment pastes with aesthetic effect – were obtained based on dioxide-titanium, metal pigment-aluminum, polymeric binder, lauryl alcohol ethoxylated with 7 moles of ethylene oxide, waxes and plasticizers and were characterized by physical-chemical, microscopical, spectral and rheological analyses. Pigment pastes with metallic effect were used in combination with film forming acrylic and polyurethane polymers, with high resistance to light and aging for finishing natural leathers, with applications in creative industries (modern footwear).