The other day I came to the realization that my Jack Spade Waxwear pocket brief (here’s a link to the Jack Spade website for the official pictures) need some serious cleaning. I received this bag for Father’s day almost two years ago, and I use it every day.  I also put it inside another larger carry-on bag when I travel.

I knew that waxwear is a peculiar material, so I first went to the Jack Spade website to see what their recommendations were. The result, waa-waa

 “Professional clean when needed” — from the Jack Spade website

Now I don’t know a professional around here that regularly cleans waxwear bags, so I took the brave step of doing it myself.  Before continuing I want to point out that Jack Spade does sell a waxwear refinishing compound that is meant to renew the finish.  I have not taken that step yet, but I will report here when I do.  Also, if there are scratches in the finish, Jack Spade recommends using a hair dryer to heat the surface and repair the waxwear.

The finish was not the concern, my bag was just dirty. In particular I had a coffee stain on the flap of one of the pockets from carrying a travel mug with a less-than-secured lid.

The pattern on the lining does a decent job of hiding the stain, but it is still an ugly stain.

Worse than the stain is the random debris that has lodged itself between the pocket flaps and the bag itself.  It sort of looks like someone took a saltine cracker and ground it into the bag.

The first thing I wanted to do was remove the crud.  I used an old toothbrush and pulled the flap away from the bag and scrubbed out the crud. Notice that in the picture below, most of the crud is already gone.

As part of the general use of the bag debris also collects in the bottoms of the pockets and the main compartment of the bag. To deal with this, the vacuum hose was deployed.

Vacuuming it out was a bit tricky because the lining kept get sucked up into the vacuum and stopping the airflow.  I had to use two hands, one to keep the lining taut, while I vacuumed.  The result was a smooth inside of the bag/pockets without gritty flotsam and jetsam at the bottom.

The exterior of the bag was a bit of a quandary.  I wasn’t sure what to use to clean the outside (if anything).  I had recently bought a box of Borax as part of science project with my daughter to grow crystals.  Reading the back of the Borax box, it said that it was a good detergent for delicates so I mixed up some in the kitchen sink with warm water. I tested it by cleaning a small part of the bag, and after finding no damage I used a rag to clean the entire outside of the bag, including the flap with the coffee stain.  I hung the back to dry on a shelf.  I also used the Borax solution to clean the strap.

I was very happy with the results. Overall the outside of the bag looked nicer (especially the gap between the pocket flap and the bag), the inside of the bag felt cleaner, and it only took about 15 minutes (including taking photos). After cleaning the bag looked cleaner, and it still has a nice patina showing that it has been well used over the past 18 or so months.