Interior questions - seeking advice

[ScottAndrews]

I think that rear seat is more of an install problem than a bad kit. The problem is most people pull off there old leather and pull on the new kit. It's just not that easy. Foam that 50 years old has taken a different shape. Seats need to be fitted, steamed etc and foam needs to be reshaped often. Sometimes an overlay of new foam shaped to fit.

I agree. As you can see in my photos above, they also use a thin layer of foam right under the leather, which further fills out the space between the leather and the harder seat foam.

I re-did my 635 seats using a kit about 20 years ago. Those seats are quite similar to the back seats in a coupe. They fit better than those seats above posted by DWMBMW, but still suffered some of the same issues (wrinkles and puckers around the edges). There are also internal casings and wires that must be attached to pull in the indents and creases. If those are not tight, then the creases will not be tight, and the covering will be baggy.

 

[ScottAndrews]

Hi everyone,

I’ve been lurking on this forum for a long time, dreaming of owning an E9. I’m happy to say I finally checked that box by purchasing Steve Armstrong’s car (Stevehose here on the forum).

As beautiful as the car is, I’m starting down the path of making it “mine,” and part of that will involve redoing the interior. At the risk of offending the purists, I’ve always envisioned a cognac interior - specifically Polaris over cognac - which has long been my dream combination (inspired in part by a 300SL Gullwing I once saw).

View attachment 218585

Other inspiration comes from this forum, including @paul

View attachment 218588
View attachment 218589

Oldenzaal:

View attachment 218591

And others:

View attachment 218590


I’ve read just about every thread here that touches on interiors - GAHH, World Upholstery, leather options, etc. - and I’m trying to pull all of that information together into a clear path forward.

I’ve been in contact with both GAHH and World Upholstery/Newark Auto and have samples on the way. So far, most of the standard “BMW” colors look lighter than what I’m after. They’re each sending some non-BMW options as well, but I’m still struggling to visualize how everything will come together across materials - vinyl door panels, leather seats, carpet, etc. As a result, I’m starting to think a fully custom interior may be the right path.

A few questions for those of you who have been down this road:

1. GAHH or World Upholstery/Newark seem like a solid solution for partial work (e.g., refreshing front seats), but do they make sense for a full interior color change?
2. The car is currently in Naples, so I’d ideally find a high-quality shop in Southwest Florida - any strong recommendations?
3. I’ll be heading back to Chicago soon, so I’m also open to having the work done there if there are better options.
4. I’ve seen several posts about shipping interiors to Coupe King - is that worth the added cost and complexity?

Any advice, lessons learned, or photos of similar builds would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Larry

If you are in Chicago, then you might want to look around the Detroit area. Some of the best auto paint and interiors I have ever seen are done by the custom guys in northern Detroit...

From personal experience Coupe King is fabulous, but they are an awfully long way from you. I am pretty sure there are folks in the midwest that can do as good or better a job.

Having done three car interiors from kits, I can say it is not easy to get the fit perfect. With practice, you can get it "OK", but a pro will always do a better job of it. In addition, with a custom interior you can do things like fully cover the vinyl door pulls, and select not only the exact color and finish for the leather, but a good shop will also do perforations and embossing, which may or may not be done well in a kit.

I was able to source beautiful leather from The LeatherHideStore, and drop shipped it to CK. They seem to have found it to be of good quality, and it was reasonably inexpensive ($300 per hide, used 6 hides for the entire interior, including those tall Scheel seats).

My $10K