It’s been a while since I last updated you. In fact I think it was January! The year continued to be really busy, helped by people locked-down and enjoying some online retail therapy! Orders finally quietened down around July, when shops began to open and people became more adventurous, leaving their houses to go on holiday. So Kath and I took the opportunity to switch my Etsy shop off, switch on the out-of-office auto-reply emails, pack up the van and head to the Scottish hills and lochs!
We found an amazing beach on the north coast of Scotland with hardly anyone about. Beautiful weather and blue seas. Absolute paradise and a well earned rest for both of us.
Enjoying views across to Skye and the Outer Hebrides in my newly refurbished deck chair, covered in leather, of course!
It didn’t take me long before I had to get some leather out though! Here I am stitching a patchwork notebook.
I finished making this patchwork notebook by a river in the Cairngorms. Such a beautiful and inspiring location!An amazing array of pebbles on a beach on the East coast.
Van life – we love it!
Can’t wait for our next trip…! I hope you all managed to get away somewhere nice this year.
And I’ll try my best to keep you more up-to-date with leather work, up-coming exhibitions, etc. Feel free to give me a kick if you’ve not heard anything from me in a while!
This chef is someone very dear to me – he’s my son!
He’s currently training in college to be a chef and when he asked me if I could make him a knife roll I jumped at the challenge!
I thought I’d try working with canvas for this project. The edges have been bound with red leather. The main section holding the knives is made with leather. It rolls up and is held closed with two straps, and can be carried with a sturdy handle and shoulder strap.
To be honest this is likely to be the only knife roll I make from canvas. The main reason is that because I do all the stitching by hand it took far longer than if it were just leather. It took me about a week to make so any future ones would be pretty pricey!
Whilst up in the Highlands of Scotland, north of Inverness, I met a man who manages 100 square kilometers of rugged mountains, forests, rivers and lochs. His name is Innes Macneill. A very knowledgeable and proud man of nature.
He saw my leather work and so sent his assistant to fetch his Spyglass. The challenge he had for me was to make a new case for it.
Both telescope and original case had lasted him 20 years but the case was starting to fall apart.
I love bespoke work so I was completely on board, even though there were a few unknowns I had yet to work out. The first challenge was working out how to mould the end pieces of leather to fit inside the tube.
Luckily he allowed me to take the old case and his spyglass away so I could make a new one to fit perfectly. This was a great honour, especially as he trusted me to take care of his precious instrument.
Innes uses his spyglass for sighting deer when stalking. The deer numbers need to be culled as there are no predators other than humans.
It is telescopic, with three sections sliding out, the last section allowing you to focus, giving a crystal clear view.
The second challenge was to learn how to line the inside with felt. I’ve never lined any of my work before so off to YouTube to find out how other people do it!
Once I’d worked out how I made a test piece, which I decided could be a dice cup (anyone want it?!)
Pleased with the result I started making the case from oak bark tanned British cow leather – a very traditional and rugged leather that will last for many years to come.
It took me two full days but I got there in the end. And what a pleasurable experience it was. I molded the ends by wetting circular pieces of leather and pushing them into the right-sized cup with a slightly smaller plastic bottle! Worked a treat!
Here’s the end result:
I made a short video to show you how it all fits together…
So, do you like what you see? Do you have an unusual leather need? Something you can’t just buy from the high street or Amazon? Drop me a line and I’d be happy to chat. Or maybe you also have a Gray & Company spyglass that needs a new case!
A lady brought me this bag that was her Grandfather’s bag, made about 80 years ago. Some stitching had failed and one of the side walls had collapsed. Here’s what I did to repair it.
You can see how the side wall had collapsed. Looking inside, after removing the deteriorating lining, the reinforcing cardboard was broken.
To straighten this out I soaked the cardboard to soften it, then flattened it out and left it to dry with weights holding it down. Once dry I glued a new reinforcing piece of cardboard in place.
Next up was time to fix the holes in the corners where the stitching had deteriorated.
There were two ways to fix this. The first was to remove the metal frame around the opening, remove the reinforcing cardboard and turn the bag inside out. This seemed too big a job and I was in danger of not finding the correct rivets to attach the frame again. So I opted to wearing a head torch, and using a curved needle to work from inside the bag! Quite fiddly but possible.
Finally the bag needed a good clean, oil and wax, and it was ready to go. A beautiful little thing. I’d love to work on more of these. An absolute pleasure.
If you have an old and cherished leather item that’s in need of some love and repair then please drop me a line with some photos. I’d love to help.
I’ve always cared about the environment and dislike the amount of plastic floating around, especially single-use plastic. I aim to produce leather goods that will last for years and not just be thrown away. So here’s my new line of leather covers for glass bottles. You can fill your bottle with tap water (or something stronger!) and enjoy the unadulterated taste of drinking from glass – plastic bottles make drinks taste horrible, in my opinion.
For the past 10 years I’ve been juggling my leather work with my office job in Preston. But finally all my hard work of building my leather skills and my leather work business has paid off, so I handed in my notice in July! Hooray!! I’m having to work my 3 months notice, so October 4th 2019 is my final day of working for the “man”! Can’t wait!
So, here’s where you come in. In order to make sure I can continue to feed my family I need my orders to continue to come in thick and fast. Please let people know about my work. Not only do I sell ready-made leather products but I also:
work with customers on bespoke items,
carry out repair work,
run courses on leather work, and
sell small pieces of leather for you to work with.
Here’s to a future of creating and making, rather than sitting in front of a computer screen all day long!
I’ve been making these simple leather covers for Rite in the Rain notebooks. If you’ve not heard of these world-renowned notebooks then read on! They are coated with a special substance that means they don’t get wet, and can be written on with a biro or pencil in all weather. I’ve been using them for years and love them.
They’re made in the North West region of USA (Washington State) where they get their fair share of wet weather, so they know what they’re doing. I started using them on outdoor courses years ago when I used to do a lot of greenwood working. If you’re an outdoor person that likes to make notes then these are the booklets for you!
Recently I developed 2 new designs for these books – a vertical flap and side flap (a bit like my Kindle covers!). Here’s a few photos to show you what I mean:
I’ve been making quite a few leather covers for Kindles and other e-readers recently. The two main designs are the vertical flap and the side flap. The Kindle is held in place with a strap at the top and corner tabs at the bottom. This allow all buttons and ports to be available for use. They work with the older Kindle versions and the new Paperwhite touchscreen versions.
