I considered the leatherette but then I felt it, and it felt like plastic, so I splashed out and bought the leather.

 

uh, buzzy? it IS plastic.

 

How is the leather poor quality? Any leather owners what to chime in?

 

http://www.gbmini.net/mtblog/archive/000346.shtml

I think many leather owners have (or will) experience this because of the shape of the seat. Unfortunately, I found MINIs leather to be fairly low quality, parring up with many GM products. The leatherette is close enough to the leather that it doesn't bother me a bit. People always ask about the seats being leather, so I guess it fools them too.

 

No complaints here. 1 year no problems. You can't get leatherette that looks like this.

 

Wow, that's a bummer. I wonder if the owner had maintained it with leather care. What to do... the adjustable lumbar feature on the leather seat is something I would want though.

 

Byers (not mini, that i know of) in columbus sells custom leather seats for about 900 dollars. You can have color inserts that are perforated (or not), and i can say from comparing the two, that the custom job is much MUCH nicer and more supple than the mini's leather interior.

Now, this is a dealership. Go out and find some small shop that will do this, and if you get some feedback and see examples of the work the shop does, it will be of better quality than the leather seats in the mini. Plus, if and when the leather goes to crap, you can just take it off and still have your factory seats. smelling like sweated through leather.

harharhar

I think you're screwed one way or the other.

personally, i have the space cloth, and i couldnt be happier. excellent material.

 

The problem is not so much conditioning as how you get in and out of the car. The first time I took my car over to my parents house, my Dad said "You better be careful getting in and out of it." He does a lot of custom upholstery and he noticed that the edge of the sport seat both sticks out some and it makes it very hard for people to not rub it as they sit. If you can move your back in a way not to hit it, you'll be fine.

 

That makes sense. I have sport seats in my VW and the side bolster on the backrest does stick out quite a bit. After 3 years and 85K miles, my leather seats are wearing well and the edge of the backrest shows no sign of wear.

 

My opinion? Order the leatherette and take it to a good upholstery shop and have REAL leather installed. I feel the Mini leather does not fit up to normal BMW standards for $1300.00.


Or how about some Sparco sport seats?

 

Saw a jetta today that had sparcos..