the production process
I work in a converted bakery in the middle of hebden bridge, my workshop is quite small so I have to make use of the walls and ceiling to hang up all of my tools and leather scrap pieces, large hides of leather are kept rolled in brown paper upstairs, and all of my brown paper patterns are kept in an old filing cabinet. I am surrounded by old saddles, travelling bags, binocular cases, shoe lasts and technical books, all covered in a fine layer of leather dust!
I follow the same process for almost all of my products. once the leather has been selected, I lay out each brown paper pattern piece then cut each panel by hand. the raw edges are rounded and dyed to match the main body of the bag. I mark out the stitch holes with a punch along a compass inscribed line, making a note of the number of holes along each seam so that they match up.
the thread is then coated with a mix of tar and beeswax that I make myself, for black stitching, or just beeswax for white and I measure roughly the amount I will need for each seam and thread onto each end a large blunted needle.
once the two pieces of leather have been matched up they can be clamped together in a saddler's 'clam', which looks like a giant pair of tweezers, and sewn up. the front buckle is the first to go on and it's matching billet is the last. finally, when all the seams are finished, I pack out the bag to give it shape as it 'settles' and dye any edges I may have missed, then wax the entire bag and buff it off to a mirror shine.