Restoring my Buckingham?

My Buckingham is my first real Filofax, bought in 2001. It has black, soft smooth leather that I previously thought was indestructible. My Buckingham has done a lot of really hard traveling around the world with me. It was used heavily for nearly a decade.

A couple of years ago I noticed my Buckingham was finally starting to show some signs of wear on the cover. Nothing that anyone else would even notice, really, just a couple of places where the leather was lightly scuffed.  So to preserve its beauty, I put it on the shelf in semi-retirement.

Ironically, it has suffered far worse damage in retirement than it ever did in all those years of heavy use.

Its first major damage happened in transit here to Jakarta. I packed it in my air shipment, which was supposed to arrive a week after we moved but ended up sitting in customs for a month. In the tropical Indonesian heat. And I had very stupidly packed my Buckingham right next to a plastic-covered planner. The plastic melted slightly onto the leather cover of my Buckingham, leaving much of it shiny.  I was very upset about it, and angry at myself for making such a mistake.

So I put it on my shelf with my other Filofaxes, carefully (I thought).  Unfortunately I didn't pay attention to the fact that the back cover was right up against a Domino, and every time I put a book in or out of that shelf the shifting of my Buckingham against the Domino's round strap dug and scuffed the leather right across the back of the binder, much to my heartbreak.

Then to add insult to injury, the front cover of the Buckingham was up against one of my Finsbury Filofaxes. Who knew that the knobbly texture of the Finsbury would imprint itself into the soft leather of the Buckingham??

So first of all I've learned my lesson: this beloved Filofax must be stored in a box, no exception.

Another problem caused by shelving my Buckingham is that during the years it has not been handled on a daily basis the leather has started to look cracky along either side of the spine where the leather creases when the binder is open.  All those years of handling my Filofax every day kept it smooth and supple with the oils from my hands. Now it's really starting to show signs of neglect.

Now I'm faced with the question of what to do to try to restore my beloved Buckingham to some of its former glory. My first solution was of course to take it off the damn shelf and put in on my desk along with all my other in-current-use books, and to handle it as often as possible. Already it's looking better--the Finsbury impressions are coming out, and the cracky areas are smoothing. The shiny plastic residue has mostly rubbed off.

But I still have the horrible scuffs on the back cover. Luckily it is the back, and the front is not nearly as marred. But I would like to try to smooth that out.

I haven't tried the Nivea creme trick, because I'm afraid the mineral oil base would remove some of the leather's dye color. I think probably the best thing to do would be to handle it as much as possible, and the scuffs will smooth out at least a little bit over time.

Which brought me to the realization: Filofaxes, especially the well-made leather ones, are like living things. They must be handled and cared for. They need attention and love. Left on the shelf to languish, they wither and die.

So please, learn from my mistakes!  And if anyone has any ideas for getting scuffs out of soft, smooth leather please let me know!

Free For All Tuesday No 53

Tuesday the day for Filofax questions and answers...  Go on..... I know you have been stood at the back whilst everyone has been in the spotlights... time to step forward and ask your question.

How do you use - Day per Page

So this week let us focus on people that use a 'Day per Page' diary insert or DPP to all Philofaxers!

So the Day per Page, they are standard in most sizes, there are a few variations, some have appointment times, there are some slight variations,  Some have reduced space for Saturdays and Sundays. Some available in cotton cream. Single language, multi language, non-English. So quite a variety in just this one format.

So if you are a DPP person.... how do you use it? Tell us about your use of this format, include links to a Flickr photo if that helps. Include as much or as little detail as you like. Which version of the DPP do you use... etc etc.

Guest Post - Retired Filofax - Michael

Today it is great to host a post from Mike, who also writes on his Phillytyper.com blog.

Below my beloved Slimline in pigskin, Made in England--complete with gold "Harrods" stamp, where I bought it on my first visit to London in the '80s. I was never without it and burned through all sorts of inserts, which a local Philadelphia stationer would order for me. I was my first. So, here's the 1980s, early 90s….

The odd drawing inside, "Evil Paper" was done by mischievous son when he was about 11 or so. After a while (like 8 years!) it got a bit beat-up, but also couldn't handle all the pages. Sometimes you can be too thin...

So it was supplanted by a chunkier Personal in black Morocco Grain Leather, with no model name, just stamped "2MLG 7/8" -- that went out of service around 1997, victim of my infatuation with the first U.S. Robotics Palm Pilot electronic organizers, the scion of a series of disposable and ultimately infuriating little gadgets!

Also tried a few Dayrunners, but their cheapish vinyl and insets with bold type declaring, "ACTION-GOALS" and such were a bit too strivey for me! The simple "To Do" and Tels. seemed more proper, and so the Personal worked hard from early '90s to A.D. (After Digital) The last months of 1997 are sadly blank--my affairs were being tracked with a device that I dutifully plugged into a plastic cradle each day to "sync" it. It all seemed so modern… for a while, at least.

The cryptic scribble, "Spend 1 Day Week on C. Ad." i.e, Career Advancement, was advice given me by photographer friend, who wisely noted that yes, do your job, but also spend time seeking people who want you to do your job or who can show you how to do it better, so you don't end up with 20 years of experience that turns our to be all the same year!

Then, about a year ago, I made the leap--more of a stroll, really, back into the analog world of daily Filofaxing. Sure, I have an iPhone now, but I also have a Filofax Luxe Compact--which has rings that are a bit bigger than the slimline, but smaller than the Personal--like Goldilocks, I feel the Compact ring capacity is "juuuust rightttt" and hope they make more in that size.

And today, the Compact carries on--here, overlooking my son's old schoolyard. He likes notebooks, but at 15--no Filofax yet!

Both veterans--the battered Slimline and the still-crisp Personal--are wedged onto a shelf with the refills; the Slimline is empty, so I can't recall so much of what I was doing that, er, decade!… paging through the Personal, though--wow, old work phone numbers; one for a nanny named Lem-Lem--she had a tiny blue cross tattooed on her forehead right at the hairline, and a huge smile and big strong forearms… a receipt for a bass amp, tels for half-a-dozen camera shops--all closed in the wake of the digital tsunami…. can't say that looking at a bunch of blank-screened Palm Organizers brings back any such feelings whatsoever. They're not obsolete--they're just taking a break.

Well, I've certainly drunk deeply of the Filofax Kool-Aid this time 'round… so much so that I've started selling them in Philadelphia (inside a bike shop, oddly enough), and am mulling a Filofax meet up at a local pub in early February. But I'll leave it up to Steve, Nan and Laurie if they'd like to have more details on that here at Philofaxy.

---Michael McGettigan , Philadelphia USA / phillytyper.com

Thank you Michael, it was great to see those older Filofax organisers and if anyone would like the details of the Meet Up that Michael is planning in Philadelphia, then contact Philofaxy and we will forward on your emails.  

A5 Compacts....

Another frequent request seen on Philofaxy... a slimmer A5. I know we have all seen and commented about the Adelphi not quite being what we had in mind. Whilst it had the smaller rings it lost it with the additional bulk of the binder itself.

So in order to counteract these comments... we will be seeing compact A5's this year... they will all come with 20 mm rings and they are:

• Regency
• Luxe
• Boston
• Pennybridge Zip

I'm not sure if all of these will officially arrive on the UK website, but that doesn't normally stop keen buyers from finding what they want else where!

Availability from about June 2012 onwards possibly before.