Lambskin quality and durability for casual use?

[Edward]

Apart from that one tear 20 years ago, there's never been any problem with this jacket. (And to the "Wested jackets aren't milspec tough" crowd: that includes the cotton lining, all the stitching and hardware. Everything's held up beautifully to annual use since 2003.) So in my experience, there's no problem with lambskin jackets if you don't abuse them.

On the specific milspec point, I doubt many of those people have handled an original A2 at that rate.... they weren't always "all that" by modern standards of durability either. Mind you, I doubt much of the milspec clothing back then was particularly designed with long term durability in mind. Certainly all too many of the poor ******s conscripted into wearing it didn't need it for as long as I'm sure they and theirs had hoped.

I think lambskin is super comfortable but they don't keep shape well and look wrinkled and cheap. I haven't seen one that I love as most come from fashion brands that just glue everything together.

In terms of it being "cheap", well... there's lamb and there's lamb. Lamb is popular with fast-fashion producers as they're not making products that are expected to last, and it's easy and cheap to work with because it doesn't require the sort of hefty equipment that heavier hides do. There are all sorts of grades of lamb (in terms of quality of tanning and such). It does get written off as 'cheap' because a lot of cheap products use lamb, but you're into correlation rather than causation there...