• Back ·
  • Real Leather Printing
Printing on Leather

Reviews for Leather Printing

Printing on Leather

Photo Print On Leather Made in the UK Made in the UK

Save 3% from £24.26 Was £25.00

Photo print on leather is perfect for making your own personalised leather bags, wallets and other unique...

Read More

  • salespoint-img

    Ships in 2 - 3 days

  • salespoint-img

    UK delivery: £5.99

  • salespoint-img

    Buy now, pay later

Print on Demand Leather:

  • Genuine 100% leather
  • Several types of real leather available
  • Printed directly on the leather
  • Made to order in the UK
  • No minimum order
  • Suitable for fashion, DIY projects & bag making

Print-on-demand leather gives you the ultimate opportunity to make your own homemade purses, wallets or custom leather bags, printed with a design that reflects your style.

We only source the best quality leathers that are soft to touch and great to work with. Over time, you'll notice your printed leather develops a natural patina that simply adds to the charm. With a choice of leathers, both smooth and debossed leathers our white base colour makes for a beautiful, accurate print.
  • 100% real leather
  • Long-lasting full-colour print
  • Print your patterns, illustrations, photos
  • Different size choices dependant on leather
  • Develops authentic patina over time
  • Perfect for making personalised leather gifts
  • Expertly printed to order in London, UK
  • Keeps original handle, doesn't stiffen
  • Anti-wrinkle, anti-creasing dependent on leather
  • Durable, rub-proof (tested)
  • Ink as strong as the leather

Range of Real Leathers

Browse our range of real leathers

  • Soft White Nappa Texture 0.7-0.9mm

    Soft White Nappa Texture 0.7-0.9mm

    • Max Print:
      0.5m
    • Roll Width:
      0.52m

    Soft nappa that is pliable. Bovine full grain leather. 0.7 - 0.9 mm thick. Stamped 'Bison' grain textured face, white base.

    Composition:

    100% Full Grain Leather

  • Double butt 2.4-2.6mm

    Double butt 2.4-2.6mm

    • Max Print:
      1.5m
    • Roll Width:
      1.52m

    Thick cow's leather. Full grain double butt. 2.4 - 2.6 mm thick. White base colour.

Care instructions

Always test an offcut or sample prior to working the leather with tools, adhesives or heat. To ensure the leather print on your product is as durable as possible, we’ve worked hard refining our printing process and craftsmanship. As leather is a natural material you may notice small differences in surface and texture, as well as wrinkles, which is common to products made from natural leather. All leathers age naturally according to the usage, and this can cause the print to wrinkle or fade slightly over time. It is possible the base colour may show through the leather as it ages with wear. When not in use we recommend storing your product in a protective dust bag or box to keep your product looking its best. Avoid prolonged exposure to extreme heat, sunlight, water, and chemical cleaners to maintain a bright and long-lasting print. Avoid contact with light coloured fabrics or upholstery as the colour may transfer. Whilst a light rain shower is unlikely to harm, we recommend protecting from rain. Should your product get wet, allow to dry naturally away from direct heat. To clean surface wipe only with a damp lint free cotton cloth.

  • Wipe with a lint free cloth
  • Do Not Wash
  • Avoid high temperatures
  • Avoid direct sunlight
  • Avoid chemical cleaners
  • Avoid rain and water
strong fabric

Martindale tested for strength
Download Certificate

Made with the most up-to-date technology

We only source the best quality leather to make your customised prints, leaving the reverse unfinished for an authentic look and feel. To create such bold, vibrant, prints, we transfer your photo print on leather using digital leather printing. This ensures the ink won't peel away or scratch off, creating an everlasting leather photo. Your print on leather will be as strong as the leather itself, for a truly everlasting personalised item.

Please note:  Printing on leather is a bespoke process, so the exact size of your piece of printed leather can be slightly smaller than the stated dimensions. This will be no more than a maximum of 4 mm.

The printed leather has a white base colour which gives wonderfully finished printed leather. Colours are true to the original, bold, bright and vivid. Fine details show up exceptionally, up to 2pt, making leather printing perfect for highly detailed prints. It can be folded, bent and stretched with little to no creasing or wrinkling, dependant on the type of leather, so will stay smooth. We use the latest leather printing technology to print your photos on leather, which we do directly onto both the flat and textured options. This makes the inks penetrate deep into the fibres and are undisturbed by the surface texture. 

What Can I Make With My Own Printed Leather?

You can make your own personalised leather bag to match your individual style. There are so many lookalike handbags on the market, but here you can be in control of the pattern, colours and shape of your bag. This will make a unique leather gift that can be used time and time again and will only get better with age. 

We've also seen customers use digital leather printing to restore accessories like wallets and purses. When you have the base interior of your purse, you can stitch your unique leather to it and turn it into a brand new fashion item. 

Upholstering furniture is another creative use for printing on leather, as you can trim chairs with your printed leather, finished with metal studs. This is a classic and traditional aesthetic that'll transform your home and decor. 
 

Important: Not suitable for children's toys or pet products, due to the risk of ink being forcefully removed and ingested.

 

Print Guideline

  • DPI-Print Guideline Icon

    What resolution is best for printing?

    All of our fabrics are printed at 200dpi. This works for us as it combines a great quality as we as a good file weight. In order to avoid resizing and interpolation, we recommend that you scale your image to 100% at 200dpi. Our design interface works with a traffic light system that acts as a quality marker for your designs. This will show you whether the resolution is too low for printing. When you re-upload your design with a highest resolution, the traffic lights will change colour, showing you're good to go. A message will pop up alongside the traffic lights to let you know if the resolution is too low or if you have a good quality image. 

  • scaling-Print Guideline Icon

    Will my image be scaled to fit?

    Your uploaded design will automatically be scaled to fit the size of fabric you've chosen. You can change the dimensions of your fabric by amending the measurements on the ‘Product Options’ tab, under ‘Print Size’. To see how this fits with the dimensions of your image/design, you can refer to the ‘Images & Text Tools’ tab under 'Quality Information'. Here, you will be able to edit the dimensions of the image.

  • RGB-CMYK Print Guideline Icon

    Should I choose RGB or CMYK?

    We always recommend using an RGB colour space when you upload your images. More specifically, we suggest using the sRGB image profile, to achieve best colour results. This will need to be done in your editing software; choose RGB as the working space, and assign the image profile as sRGB (full name sRGB IEC61966-2.1)

  • Print-Roll Length Fabric Guide Icon

    Is there a maximum length I can print on?

    There is no length limit for most of our fabrics. Our preview design window is set up to displaying a maximum of 10m to help you visualise the print, but that doesn't mean this is the print limit. If you'd like to order more, you can increase the quantity (x2 for 20m or x4 for 40m for example) and order as much as you'd like. Larger volumes will receive an automatic discount too. While the fabric length is nothing to worry about, each individual fabric will have a maximum width side: These can be found on the fabric's page information or in the design interface. 

  • Borders-Print Guideline Icon

    Should I add white space for borders or cutting onto my design? 

    Yes, that will help you when it comes to cutting or framing your printed fabric. We recommend always adding a little extra space for borders into your purchased fabric size. When we print your materials, or send out fabric samples, we typically trim squarely around the fabric, leaving approximately 5mm white space. Cutting neatly on the line has an additional fee.

  • crocking-Print Guideline Icon

    What is crocking?

    Crocking is the term used to describe fading along the creases in a fabric. It typically can occur after constant washing or heavy use of digitally printed natural fabrics. Crocking can be minimised by hand washing your fabrics at a cooler temperature, rather than machine washing. If you want to make sure there's no chance of crocking, we'd suggest you use a poly fabric. 

  • organics-Print Guideline Icon

    Is it normal for colours to appear lighter on organic fabrics?

    Yes, our organic fabrics don't have an additional coating like non-organic fabrics have, which means it absorbs the inks deep into its fibre and reducing the colour strength slightly (this can be approximately -40%). If you would like a bolder, more vibrant colour for your fabric, we would suggest using a non-organic fabric. 

  • Transfer-Print Guideline Icon

    Can I supply my own fabric for you to print onto?

    Unfortunately not; all of our fabrics have been tested meticulously to ensure we know exactly how to get the best results, and our facilities cater perfectly to them. If you are set on a fabric we don't offer, we can offer custom printed sublimation paper to order which will allow you to heat press your designs onto your own fabrics.

  • Jpeg-Tiff Print Guideline Icon

    Which is a better image format: TIFF or JPEG?

    If your design is simple and less intricate, a JPEG will be absolutely fine. However, if you have created a design with multi-coloured detailing, we would recommend saving your design in a TIFF format. 

  • Shrinkage-Print Guideline Icon

    Will my material shrink during printing?

    Similar to other fabric printing processes, shrinkage can occur. The amount of shrinkage will depend on the fabric, but as a general rule of thumb, please allow for 2-8% shrinkage when working out your measurements. Shrinkage is not an exact science, and the amount of shrinkage will vary from print run to print run. We'd always suggest order a little more than you need for your project. 

  • Print-Both Sides Print Guideline Icon

    Can I order double sided printed fabric?

    Many of the fabrics we offer are semi-transparent, so printing on both sides of the fabric is not a service we offer. 

  • Labels-Print Guideline Icon

    Can I order labels in a different fabric? Are the labels cut like normal fabric labels?

    At the moment, all of our fabric labels are printed on satin fabric. For now, we believe this is the best choice, but will potentially introduce other options in the future. All labels are cut to the same label format. If you would like to choose a different fabric and format for your labels, you could always order a sheet of the fabric of your choice to create labels yourself. 

  • Eco friendly Printing

    How do you print your fabrics in an eco-friendly way?

    Our fabrics are printed with water-based inks as environmental consciousness is always front of our minds. Water-based inks include no chemicals or solvents, and our printing process uses heat to fix colours and patterns into place to avoid excess or contaminated water returning into the water system (this is something that can occur through steaming). All printing, fulfilment and production is done in our one facility in London, and rather than rolling the fabrics or sending them in a tube, you will receive your material folded up. This amounts to 150 tubes saved a week, as well as much more space on the delivery van for more orders. (For delicate fabrics we ensure to package appropriately).

  • colour palette

    Will there be slight colour differences between my orders?

    Although very rare, there could be a slight colour difference from one print run to another. This is a normal part of the printing process, however we are always working to improve our colour profiles. It is unlikely that  the difference in print runs will be hugely different (for example, it's unlikely your orange is suddenly going to be red). The likelihood of colour variations can be intensified fabric to fabric due to materials having different grains and textures; natural fabrics typically have more muted colour tones, while poly alternatives have a bolder hue. This is because the construction of the material is different, and the printing method has to be altered slightly for more delicate, natural textiles.


Sizing For Hemming And Shrinkage

Hemming Options ICON

Our full cut & sew service at Bags of Love can be used to your full advantage. We even offer hemming for your fabrics at a small additional cost. Our hems are created with a one or two cold hem that typically uses around 5 to 20mm of fabric (depending on the thickness of your chosen material). Please bare this in mind when you are ordering your printed fabric with hems: If you would like your finished piece to be 100cm x 100cm, change your dimensions to 101.5cm instead to allow space for your hems (you will also need to include additional for potential shrinkage). The thicker the fabric, the bigger the hem will be. Your printed fabric will be hemmed with either Black or White thread. If you are ordering a lightly woven material or a printed silk, you will find that one hem will be straight, while the other slightly rippled.  The hemming material allowances are as follows and you need to make your print bigger to accommodate the hem:

  • Light Fabrics (20-100gsm): For silks and other light fabrics, we use 6-8mm in the hem (2 fold), so overall width/height will be minus 12-16mm
  • Medium Fabrics (101-200gsm): For medium-weight fabrics that fray, we use 15-20mm in the hem (2 fold) so overall width/height will be minus 35-40mm
  • Stiff/Heavy/No-fray fabrics: we use 15-20mm in the hem (1 fold) so overall width/height will be minus 35-40mm
All of these measurements can vary and should only be seen as an approximation. If you allow for hems and slight shrinkage, it can add a fairly significant amount to your ordered dimensions, so please make sure to consider these things prior to ordering. Depending on how open the weave is, our fabric can shrink anywhere from 2% to 8% with the average being 2.5%.
 

Choose From Three Finishes

We have three finishing options available: 
  • As it comes: We simply cut around your image with scissors - leaving a perhaps uneven white border. 
  • Hem with thread: We can offer your fabric hemmed with a black or white thread. This will add an additional 1-2 days of production time to your order. Please refer to the dimensions above to gauge how the hemming will affect the size of your print. You will have a choice of an overlock hem or folded hem (one or two fold depending on the fabric) however not all fabrics are suited to both hem types. In the design interface, you will be able to see which options are available to you. If you can only see one hem available, this means that this is the only suitable hem for this material type. 
  • Cut on the line: Rather than our 'as it comes' option, we will cut neatly on the edge of your design against the grain of the fabric. If you have a border around your design we will cut around that border. If the design takes up the whole fabric, we will neatly cut around the edge of the image. Cutting against the grain is standard for fabric cutting, and as such lighter materials such as Georgette or Mulmul will have a slight wave in them, and some fraying may occur. 
All of our fabrics are carefully hand cut. It is not always possible to maintain a perfectly straight cut for certain fabrics, so please bear this is mind if you see your edge has a slightly uneven look or a little fraying. This is not a flaw in the material. If you have any queries or would like to know about our cutting methods in more detail, please get in touch and we will be more than happy to discuss them with you. 

For further information about our fabrics see our FAQs

Please note: As everything we provide is handmade to order, you may find a slight variance in the sizes. 

Trending right now: