miel zaphia

Thanks for this excellent pattern! Very well executed. Look forward to making my first wallet!

No problem! There's probably a lot of stuff on that site you don't need to know, but if your willing to weed through it it is truly a wealth of information.

The knife is handmade in both circumstances; whether crafted by a knife-smith or assembled by hand in a foreign factory (possibly by little children or other under paid laborers- hence the lower price!) The difference is choosing to support someone who has a personal investment in his/her craft and receiving a quality tool as a result rather than investing your money in something mass produced poorly. For example, I recently purchased a Tandy craftsman industrial knife set which had to be returned as it arrived bent and non-fuctioning- this poorly produced product either had a manufacturing defect, or couldn't even withstand the shipping from China to Canada. Regardless, the knife was returned and I decided to spend my money on something of higher quality instead, supporting a person and not a corporation. Quality of course is subjective, but it could be argued that a knife hand crafted by one of the more highly recommended knife-smiths is likely to arrive in one piece and if cared for properly, last a lifetime. In most cases I am happy to buy bargain price items but am aware that in some cases, price is a reflection of quality and one must be willing to make that sacrifice when purchasing.

For the new leather workers out there: Just wanted to post a link that has been immensely helpful to me as a beginner. If you, like myself have already spent hours perusing the forums of leatherworker.net just trying to find a straightforward answer to your simple question such as : -which parts of the hide & weight of leather should I use for which project? -what's with all the terminology involving subdivisions of the hide? eg. double shoulder, single bend, side, double back etc -what are the basic tools and terminology & their function? -how to lace? visual and written instruction included etc. This website may help you out with many descriptions, definitions and super informative visual guides. Has become my beginner bible! www.kingsmerecrafts.com Hope you find it as useful as I have! Cheers (Not to discredit the immense amount of knowledge and useful information I have already acquired during my hours of browsing these forums-however many of those posting assume us newbies already know the basics!)

Building my tool supply on a budget. Just purchased a Tandy head knife on sale for $35.00 (still planning on getting a nice Knipshield french style head knife but thought the Al Stohlman would do fine for the time being). Does anyone have any opinions as to whether the head knife can perform well as one of these skivers? or is it worth jumping on the sale? Thanks~