cjmt

Personally I went for adjustable hight, locking jaws and that's about it. I'll post photos when mines made.

I use no 4 Thor rawhide mallets I believe

Materials and tools in the photos are largely French actually Charlie

This - it takes years and dedication. Just because someone makes something look easy doesnt mean it is! (Armitage et al..) Charlie

I don't think they stitch mark the reverse, very difficult to not make a mess of it. i think they are just good at it. Stitching takes years to perfect and to make every stitch the same you have to do exactly the same thing every single time, thats much much harder than it sounds. This is a prototype of mine looking at the reverse side. It hasn't had the edges or card slots skived as its just a mockup.You can see I haven't got the stitching quite right in the thicker areas (tension by the look of it) but its probably as your aiming for in the centre. Its just normal saddle stitch with a reasonably well struck blachard pricking iron

Thank you. Only the bottom one is Barenia, top is Vachette Natural, middle is aniline full grain veg tanned goat. The Barenia kind of illustrates what I mean - if you want to get into the Atellier style of work you have to use the best materials, preferably famous ones and then do it justice. Hunio is another Barenia user (as is Peter Nitz) and probably does it more justice than I do, have a look through his threads Charlie

There are some areas that can be automated and do good rather than harm. A seam can be better skived by machine than hand unless your very very good (which you should be before buying a machine, or you'll never learn). A clicking press will cut complicated shapes better than a human can on the whole. The art is knowing the best way to get the result you want - better not quicker though. Hermes largely have this, though they machine stitch too much IMHO. I have to say I think Kellys, birkins etc are fully hand stitched though. We do have a website and do all our business through it really. I don't post it here though, this is my private account so I can say what I like without thinking about company stuff. Couple of pictures attached. In no way are these perfect things, everything I make can always be improved in many many ways, but thats the joy of leatherwork, you can aim for perfection your whole career and never achieve it. With the exception these are hand stitched these are largely as per Hermes, Lin Cable/Barenia/Vergez Blanchard/Waxed edges etc etc

Exactly this. Your thinking about things the wrong way around. Remember you said you were going to be better than Hunio or Peter Nitz? Look at the photos of construction that Hunio in particular publishes. Do any of the steps in his work look like he's cutting corners or making things as fast as possible? Even for simple products the steps required are detailed and intricate and about making as perfect a thing as possible. For legitimate high end work the process works like this Theres a demand for lovely thing X To make lovely thing X in as good a way as its possible for me to do so will take x hours I need to buy tool x y and z Im therefor going to charge price Z. This is an expensive price but thats because its a lovely thing You are starting of by thinking I want to make thing X and will charge Y because thats what I think the market is I have to maximise profit so I have to make these as fast as possible, what can I do without it being a bit rubbish? That works if you have a factory - you don't and your competitors do, they will eat you alive and spit out the little bits of your clicker dies.... As a not to snarky aside, the motorised gismo you recommended me is around 1/3 the price I charge for a finished watch strap - you'll offend the people here who are trying to help you if you dish out too much "advice"! Charlie

There's some good advice in this thread. Specifically you can't compete with China, you'll never succeed if you try to do that, particularly hand stitching. Anyone can import a container load for a tenth of what you can make them for and if your just going to bash things out as fast as you can there isn't going to much difference between your work am mass produced stuff To go high end you need to spend time on what you make, the details count. For eg I budget a minimum of half an hour just for the edges of a watch strap and 45 mins isn't unusual...

Hi Walter Do you have more than one pair? Charlie

Brave words! Hard work will only get you so far, a certain amount of talent is needed as well! Best of luck, I'm a great believer in aiming high and trying hard Charlie

Personally I agree, you have to aim high, try hard and aim to succeed, you certainly won't I you don't. Two small notes of caution though. Be aware that Hunio and Peter nitz are very, very good. Aim to emulate them but realise it will take years and hard work/talent. Also, you'll never have a viable business if you aim to do it through hand making but being cheap, you can't do both, at least in my experience. You need a minimum of a half decent product at a half decent price, if you aim for the bottom foreign factories will just undercut you Charlie

Fine, a hobby to him right now maybe. Everyone including Hermes started somewhere though and this forum has seen people go from beginner to very good pro (Peter nitz for eg) in double quick time. Whilst the chances are your right one should never say never...

Tell that to Hermes or in fact the substantial number of pros around here! Charlie

Mine are scheduled to be made in May! They are around 300 but I'm not sure Fred is planning to continue making them sadly Charlie

I suspect the Le Prevo are by an ex Dixons man who has set up by himself. If so i have 2 of them as well - they are quite hefty, really too much so for fine work but strong and long lived. I think Abbey sell them as well. I'd be interested to see a photo if you have one Charlie

Quick photo One Blanchard no 10 10 tooth - quite recent, one old Dixon no 10. In Blanchard term no 10 = c. 10 tip and Dixons no 10 = 10 spi so a no 11/11 Blanchard is functionally equivalent to a 1" no 10 Dixons. In terms of quality - old Dixons is as good as current Blanchard. Modern Dixons however have been much worse quality for at least the last 10 years, however have got better again recently, but are still patchy in my view, at least one pricking iron we've had from them in the last year had a huge casting flaw in one tooth that QC should have rejected and the teeth are still quite wide and crude. A Blanchard however is a Blanchard, they are very consistent and Ive never yet bought a bad one. This watch strap is stitched using Blanchard no 10s and a Blanchard awl Charlie

Hi All, Havet posted anything for a little while, so thought I'd put a few pictures on of recent work. This is a prototype - natural veg tan treated with carnauba, intentionally not very protected to see how it patinates This is a production piece, gold Barenia, 1 hole only and designed with the deployant its attached to in mind Theres been quite a bit of interest on the forum about bricking irons, awls etc of late. For those interested both the straps are handstitched using 632 Ecru Lin Cable, no 10 Blanchard pricking irons and a 35mm blanchard awl. Charlie

Really nice Edd, very nicely made Charlie

Filiteuse attachments are identical to mando versions. Interesting..

From Mando by the look if it? Charlie

Hermes machine stitch the majority of their small leather goods. Multicoloured top and bottom thread is a dead giveaway, there's no way to do this with saddle stitch Charlie

I do and no, not in my opinion. Dixons are historically the English counterpart to Blanchard though they have had issues in recent years (but seem to be getting better). Barnsley has always been a slightly more budget option. Recent stuff has been really poor (nylon rollers on plough gauges for e.g.), older stuff is better but was still the budget professional choice of its time. Charlie

If all your options are for brand new pricking irons vergez Blanchard is in a totally different league to your other choices. Old dixons or if your very lucky new Dixons on a good day are their only competitors in the same league of quality Charlie

Strudel, My mistake! I thought I recognized the work as that of someone local I know. It was a compliment, he's good! Charlie