WinterBear

Man o man o man! I just got the burnishers! They are beautiful! I can't hardly wait until morning so I can try them out.

I have similar issues when binding and piping fabric, especially when the material I am using for a binding is relatively stiff and goes around a curve. You'll note that Kevin King used lambskin binding for his wallet, which is really flexible and a little stretchy. The stress of changing directions around the corner is accommodated by that stretch and flex. Dry veg tan, even thin stuff, doesn't really have that same fabric-like quality for compression along the inside of the curve and expansion at the outside edge. I'd wait for some of the experts to weigh in on solutions, but it might need for the piping, and possibly the leather lid, to be cased and stitched while wet, and then "blocked" (placed under a weight to dry flat), to stretch the piping and essentially wet-mold it around the lid and using the stretchiness of the wet-veg tan to accommodate the curve.

I should spend more time tying knots then, as we could all use a little extra luck!

Hi drphil and John. Those books for figure carving patterns are from Dover publications. I have quite a stack of them for various past projects. If anyone is interested, the they can be viewed at the Dover website if you want to take a look at the inside of one of them before buying. The ones SL Leather lists are the same price as what they currently are on Dover's site, so if you are buying leather, the shipping for the hide might also cover your books. Some examples: Castles of the World Wild Animals Favorite Dogs Many other Dover books are available, and many can also be obtained from amazon (Butterflies, Celtic Books, for example), and some book stores and hobby stores. If you're getting a lot of the books, Dover has free shipping for orders over $50, and Amazon usually has free shipping for orders over $25. My local bookstore does not usually carry more than a dozen of the titles, though, so sometimes I have to resort to the 'net. Some of the Dover books also have all of the drawings as vector art or as digital files on an included CD, such as: Castles (w/ CD), Wild and Domestic Animals, Birds. For most of these Dover art/craft resource books, the buyer has the option of using the artwork without additional special permissions, provided you do not use more than a certain number of the illustrations (usually between four and 10) per single project and that you do not make your own resource document/online archive/book/whatever. I find it's a cheap and legal way for me to get applique designs for my quilts.

Maybe a veg-tanned tooling calf skin would about the same size as tooling goat and might run about that thickness? Calfskin also tends to be pretty thin though.

Sorry to hear about your friend. The 2nd picture loaded before anything else for me, and I immediately recognized it as a javelina skull, so I'd say you did a great job. The hairing really brings to mind the surface texture weathered bone gets.

Wait...I'm confused. If he's recommending that people do this with high-quality leather, and he did it to take the dye out of a navy belt, how high quality was that belt? I mean, wouldn't a well dyed, buffed, oiled, and sealed belt be resistant to slipping dye?

Holiday weekend, they might be out of town? I'd help, but what I know about braiding rawhide you could stuff in a gnat's ear and still have room.

Hi RainMedic. Have you considered a Bible cover, rather than binding a Bible? You might find it an easier project to break into leatherwork with, and that way your girlfriend can have a cover for her favorite Bible that she currently has. Run "Bible cover" through the search bar at the top of the forum, and I think you'll see some things that will knock your socks off.

Looks sharp! I like the small details you have on this.

Nice work. I especially like the bag. How did you do the back? Is there a belt-loop or something?

What a cutie! Look at that grin. She looks like she laughs a lot. No worries on my order, I have all kinds of stuff going on and don't expect to be needing the burnishers before the 6th anyway. (I'll be up to the eyeballs with Merit Badges, an Eagle project, and some packing of my own!) Feel free to put mine towards the tail end of the list if you need to.

Heh, you might have time again once she's in school! Then the funds can go towards some of her educational needs or start a college fund? The cost of some of those college books sure made me squawk--they're one of the reasons I don't have much spending money now. ($350 for a used book and a used lab manual for just one of my classes?) I'd better get my act together and order some burnishers now that I have incentive--I'd join the procrastinator's guild, but they've never organized. Big O, my condolences.

That is not (just) a wallet. That is a work of art. It's beautiful.

azrider, I can't speak for everyone, but the only place I see both rent+commission as being fairly common in the Northern Colorado/Wyoming/parts of Utah area is the big "booth" flea market stores and antique stores around here. I don't know if this is common in other areas of the country, but this seems to be the only place I have seen it. What's more, consignors that pay "rent" often have to provide their own displays, as well as clean and maintain the booth. It's not something that I have seen in the gift stores and boutiques that do consignments--these stores seem to get their money only from the fees, and the store owner determines the square footage and location of the items in the store. I haven't done consignments in the past 5 or 6 years though, so this could be the new thing. Mark, consignment can work, but you really have to screen the people you want to consign with. When it works, everybody is happy and it's a great way to get your product to a larger market. My examples are when things go wrong. A good artisan status in the area and town (e.g., being an area known to have high quality handmade items among the tourists and townspeople), a good and legally binding contract, and well-established stores with an interest in maintaining a good reputation among the artisans they consign from all help, as do laws with teeth regarding consignment theft and contract enforcement.

I've talked to too many people who have stopped doing consignment because it is often more trouble than it is worth and they often wind up with unsalable product, if they get it back at all. I've heard of store that charge "rent" and then never display the items, or stuff them into an overcrowded shelf or bin in the back of the shop, often in a dim and uninviting area. Unsold items coming back out of rotation from the shop, but coming back stained, scuffed, scratches, missing parts, etc. Items that were "stolen" out of locked cases. Items that were excessively handled and soiled. Silver allowed to tarnish. Long items being allowed to drag on the floor and being stepped on and damaged. Long waits for payments of things that had actually sold, even if payments were supposed to be monthly. The stores accepting a returned product after the customer had damaged it, and then returning the damaged item to the artisan who cannot now sell it (one particularly bad one was where the customer had shut the purse strap in the car door, and the purse was dragged along the street for several miles. The store accepted the by now badly scuffed and scarred purse and gave the woman the money back, and the purse was sent back to the maker--maker lost a salable item, lost the consignment fee when the item was sold too). Now of course most of these folks had contracts with the store that was supposed to cover theft and damage while those items were in the store, but collecting was another thing, especially for the shops out of town. I also know of two separate instances where the store closed and the items were disposed of without the knowledge of the consignors (theft on a grander scale, but still hard to get it prosecuted). So the people I know, instead of paying a consignment fee of 40-60% will offer to sell to the store owners at a wholesales price--like 50% off the retail! If they really want your item that much, they will do it. They still get the item they want, they get their cut, but they are now invested in protecting it and displaying it so it will sell--and you get your money up front and don't have to worry about the items being damaged. Even if offering the item at a wholesale discount will not make you quite as much as getting your percentage after a consignment sale--you have the money in hand and will have no issues with lost or damaged product because it is now the store owner's problem to worry about it. If you want to consign, screen the places. How much are their fees--Does it sound too good to be true or does it seem greedy? Talk to other consignors if you can (best if you can do so without the owner's knowledge). What are their opinions? Do they feel it is a good relationship with respect and satisfaction on both sides? Or do they have problems with getting their money? Are you able to walk into the store at any time during normal store hours, unannounced, and see your items? What is the clientele--Is it a suitable match for your product based on the other items in the store and the customers? Are consigned products displayed beautifully and correctly lit--and just as well displayed as the store-owned items? Are the displays clean? Are the items in the store windows sun-faded? Are the salespeople knowledgeable about hand made products? Do the sales clerks wipe fingerprints off before putting items back in the cases (prevents soiling and tarnish)? Are fingerprints cleaned off the glass display cases and any display features dusted? Will your items be protected from excessive shop-wear and shoplifting?

Hi there. Welcome. Check out this thread for picture posting options: http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=15122 Basically, you can upload pictures to LW to host, which is what that thread mostly discusses, or you can link pictures from your own host. If you have your own host, you can link your pictures directly using the little icon above the reply/topic box--it looks like a small Polaroid. Click that and insert your picture's url.

It looks like it's a loom woven strip, rather than each bead sewn on? I think the strip is stitched to the bottom layer, and a "window" or side strips overlain or butted alongside the beadwork for the top layer. Examples of loom beadwork: http://wikibase.info/23234-instructions-for-basic-loom-beadwork.html http://www.crazycrow.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=CCTP&Product_Code=4976-002-037 http://sites.google.com/site/beadedsaddle/pricelist http://www.crazyacreswolfranch.com/Review.html Leather belts / collars with loom work that look similar: http://www.moldychum.com/home-old/tag/reserve-belt-company http://www.kaboodle.com/reviews/beaded-dog-collar-free-us-shipping-by-leathernbeads-on-etsy http://rollingthunder-leather-beadwork.com/Beaded.htm http://www.sheplers.com/tony-lama-mens-beaded-leather-belt-reg-big.html My sister and I used to do quite a bit of looming. If you decide you want to loom your own strip, drop me a line and I'll try to help.

Nice work. I'm not much into purses (mostly because I'm such a flake that if I isn't in my pocket, I'm inclined to leave it somewhere!), but I would make an exception for this. Good job on the win.

If you can't find a car window, try some of these sources: Home improvement stores--tile department. Can sometimes find 6x6x 1/4" thick glass tiles. Hobby and home decor stores--look where they have candles. Can sometimes find a flat unrimmed glass slab of the appropriate thickness. Kitchen supply-- can sometimes find glass cutting boards, but I generally find these too thin for anything but casual use. I've also found thicker glass "cheese boards" at places like Ross, TJ Maxx, and KMart. However, specifically, it looks like it is being skived on a glass burnisher, such as what can be found from Tandy. (http://www.tandyleat...ts/8120-00.aspx)

Wow, look at the details on that thing. Color me impressed.

If you want, I have some odds and ends of that plastic, and a few other types, that I could give you. That way you could play with it a bit and see what you think of it. I could mail a few pieces in a flat rate envelope.