Partial Interiors

Are you trying to replace a portion of your old and worn-out interior? Looking for a solution for that driver’s side cushion or backrest that is cracked and faded? The solution typically requires repair from a shop or replacement of the pieces in disrepair. A partial replacement seems like a simpler, easier, and less expensive option than replacing a whole seat or the entire interior, but this is not always the case.

At LeatherSeats.com, we design our interiors to give the customer the greatest savings when purchasing the whole interior kit, but in some cases we can sell specific upholstery parts of the interior as might be needed by the customer.  However, we do not typically advise our customers to replace less than the full row of upholstery. Replacing only a small portion of an existing interior can result in a less than optimal outcome.

Take a look at our front seat upholstery replacement video for the 2004-2008 Acura TL. While the new leather looks great next to the factory plastics, there is a noticeable contrast between the original worn-out factory covers in color and finish. In person, these differences may be more apparent when it comes to finer details like grain texture, color, and variations in perforation and stitching. Considering these differences, replacing only one or two pieces of the front row would not work well for this application. For this customer’s build, replacing the upholstery for both front buckets seats turned out to be a great option.

  • Repaired leather interior
  • Front backrest and headrest

Upholstery Replacement

Although most of the time replacing single parts or pieces of your interior is not feasible, there are instances where it might make sense, but we would suggest contacting us first. We will need to ensure that we have the correct pattern that will fit and match your factory configuration. Typically we start by requesting photos of your factory seats so we can verify we have a compatible and cosmetically similar option. From there we will offer to send you color samples so you can select the closest option to your factory upholstery.

Damaged leather upholstery

Before

Repaired leather upholstery

After

Keep in mind most car manufacturers produce many different interior variations and colors for each generation of the vehicle. This variation makes matching an existing interior difficult, but it is not impossible if the pattern and materials can be matched closely enough.

Most OEM manufacturers will produce several seating configurations per vehicle.  In 2010, Toyota built the Camry with at least 3 different seating configurations for the US domestic market. Each seating configuration has to be patterned and produced as a separate/independent pattern number. This can vary based on the manufacturer, model, or even model trim.

It is also common for manufacturers to build a factory cloth and factory leather version of each seating configuration. These versions are many times identical, but there are cases where the factory cloth version and the factory leather version are completely different in dimensions, attachment points, and style. LeatherSeats.com generally patterns the factory cloth versions for our kits, so for a few interiors where the factory cloth and factory leather are completely different, we might not have the applicable pattern.

However, always call us to check.  Some of these factory leather and factory cloth versions produced by the manufacturers are the same in dimensions and attachment points but are only different in style.  This is much more common and can be very conspicuous or very subtle.  In these cases that both cloth and leather versions of the pattern will work interchangeably, but the styling or cosmetic pattern of the upholstery will be different.  As a result of this issue, we request that any partial interior inquiries contact our upholstery professionals for more compatibility information.