Understanding Leatherwork

Handmade leatherwork ranges from simple stitched goods to elaborately tooled and carved pieces, but almost all of it starts with the same basic material decisions and hand skills.

Tanning, briefly

Vegetable-tanned leather is tanned using plant tannins in a slower, traditional process; it holds tooling and stamping well, ages by darkening and developing a patina, and is the leather most associated with carved or stamped work. Chrome-tanned leather is tanned using chromium salts in a faster process, producing a softer, more flexible, often more water-resistant material common in bags, garments, and upholstery — but it doesn't take tooling the way vegetable-tanned leather does.

Core hand techniques

• Cutting — leather is cut to pattern using a sharp utility or head knife against a straightedge or template.
• Stitching — most quality handmade leather goods use saddle stitching, a hand technique using two needles and waxed thread that stays intact even if one stitch is later cut, unlike a single-thread machine stitch.
• Tooling and stamping — designs are pressed into dampened vegetable-tanned leather using swivel knives and stamps, a technique with deep roots in Western and equestrian leatherwork.
• Edge finishing — cut edges are beveled, burnished (smoothed with friction and often water or a burnishing compound), and sometimes dyed for a clean, finished look.