irishsuperfly

Lake Street Dive: wow, totally not the voice I was expecting to come out of her! Beautiful voice and song, though! I'll have to check out more of their music. I listen to all sorts of music but lean toward more mellow stuff while working leather. Bonnie Raitt, Alison Krauss or Dave Matthews, to name a few. Tedeschi Trucks Band isn't what I'd call mellow but a definite go-to when I need a pick me up. Susan Tedeschi is another one like Rachael Price - you just don't expect to be blown away by her voice when you see her.

Beautiful quiver. I couldn't answer with 100% certainty but my guess is that the dye was airbrushed. You can get a "fade" effect by thinning your dye and applying multiple layers, but that quiver looks closer to an airbrush in my amateur opinion. By the way, LOVE the Firefly stuff you posted in the gallery. How did you do the lettering on them?

Your kid is sitting there so nonchalantly. I'm sure he's thinking he'll have it easy with any messes he makes after this one.

I'm probably not the right person to offer advice on pricing. Others with more experience would be better. That said, I sold my fobs for $8 - a lot of people looked at them and had positive comments but not one person seemed turned off by that price. My friend and my dad said I was underselling myself but they're my first pieces and I really couldn't bring myself to mark them up any higher. I tried to do a little pricing research before the show but didn't spend enough time on it to get a good feel for what I should be pricing them.

We made it through the show yesterday. I didn't get to say "I told you so" regarding my own sales (but I did sell two key fobs! ) although most of my friend's sales were things she premade and only one custom order on the spot. I still think having more inventory on-hand and ready to go is the best strategy for sales, she just didn't have much time before the show to stock up. Hopefully she'll get some business afterward from people she talked with about custom orders. I wish there was a way to track those sales, but I can't think of anything other than offering a discount code related to the event for people to enter into her website when they purchase. I didn't get any bracelets made in advance, which might have gotten me more sales. I got lazy and sat around twiddling my thumbs the whole time instead of working on making bracelets. I need a good, sturdy work surface for setting snaps, etc next time. I think we did alright with the prep but a checklist would help things go more smoothly. Seems there's one thing that always gets forgotten!

So, an update. I have a slightly better feeling about the 3D printed stamps now. It turns out the first attempt was not a solid block but honeycombed - that's why it caved. For the second print the guy specified that the block "base" should be solid fill and it held up great for the imprint I needed. I haven't put it through a test to see how many imprints I can get out of it, but I was very happy with the result on my aunt's guitar pick case and the stamp held up to me really cranking down on the press. Nick, glad to hear your CNC router is working so well! I still want one, but it will have to wait awhile. I'll stick with 3D printing and if I need a stamp to last a little longer I might try casting a resin mold of it. Much cheaper route than a CNC or laser for now.

Surprisingly, the base broke. It should have been solid, but I'm not sure that it ended up that way. The letters sort of cave inward just a fraction and there's a slight buckle along the side of the base with a barely noticeable concave to the top of the block where the text meets it. The pics didn't really show it well so I didn't bother to post them. After my coworkers see it, we'll probably dissect it to see if there was some empty space in the block or something. Or maybe it's as you said, and the text caused the buckling by shifting under the pressure. I might try making a resin mold out of the next one so I don't have to keep bugging the 3D printer guy for a 1" block. Unfortunately, this is probably going to be just a one time product for my aunt so it's not like I'll a need a tiny "Donna" stamp often. I do want to make sure I can get a good imprint in the thin leather, though, so I might have to go with resin - I'm guessing that would hold up to more pressure in the press than the 3D stamp would. Nick, how small of a stamp have you made with your laser engraver? Seems like you get some pretty good detail on your stamps.

I put my first 3D printed stamp to test, and it didn't take long at all to break it. I just sent off a revised version to get printed and hopefully will have that one tomorrow or Friday. It's only costing me 25 cents to have these printed so I didn't mind playing a game of "stamping roulette" with it. The impression actually came out pretty good. Unfortunately, the leather I need to use for my project is very thin and I'm not sure that I'll be able to get a good imprint due to the leather (2/3 oz). I was being a little more gentle with it on the first two presses too, so that may be why the thinner leather didn't show as well. It looks great on 8/9 oz. I should add that it was printed with ABS. I've never added pics before so hopefully this works. Just for scale: And the outcome:

This is a great topic! Thanks for sharing experience. A friend of mine is doing a charity show in two weekends and it dawned on me that I should be busy making key fobs and bracelets to sell there. Of course, it means I'll be on the hook to help her but it wouldn't be the first time so I might as well get some compensation for it! She started out around this time last year, just going to any local craft show she could find. The people who attend those things are so fickle. Since most of the shows were holiday related, she and her mom were doing really fancy ornaments and cute quilts with very little selling. She's settled into a better niche now (that she's also passionate about so that helps), doing paracord braiding for horse and other pet gear, chooses her shows a little more carefully, and tries to stick with horse-related functions. Her sales are at least enough to break even at most shows but still not great. I keep telling her she needs to either pre-make or take some cord along to make bracelets on demand but she doesn't bother. I really think those type of small, impulse buys are what people will spend money on at shows. She's gotten custom orders but the people who come to her with specific needs are the minority. After the last show I helped her with, I suggested she make business cards that have a specific discount code on them so she can track how many sales she got from the show after-the-fact. I'm not convinced that many of the people who took a card with an "oh, I'll definitely check out your website and place an order" actually follow through with it. So, shamelessly, part of my interest in making up some little odds n ends stuff to sell is to see if my theory is right. I'd love to see her get some profit at these things and maybe I can convince her that having more of the smaller, ready made things are worth having at her booth. It's not often I get to say "I told you so" either, so here's hoping. Edit: I'll pass on the other idea mentioned here about actually working on an item during the show. Maybe people seeing her braiding a halter will prompt some more sales, so thanks for that suggestion! If I end up going with her I'll take along some things to work on. Better than sitting around doing nothing between potential customers.

Is the fact that I read through this entire thread proof enough that I like bad jokes? (or maybe just reeeally bored) Access please and thanks, Johanna!

As a fellow newbie to leather working, all I can really offer is some empathy. I love working with clay. Make a mistake? Just reform it! I am trying hard to stick to a small budget getting into leather and the thought of ruining even a piece of scrap is enough to make me hesitate starting on something. The only advice I could offer is to just throw that caution to the wind and jump in with both feet. I'm trying to accept that I'll waste some leather in the process, but I'll never get better if I don't try!

Thanks for all the info, Nick! As soon as I said delrin, my dad knew exactly what I was talking about. He knows someone with a CNC router he's going to put me in touch with. In the meantime, I made a simple name stamp in SketchUp and sent it off to the 3D printer guy. I'm really impatient to see how that works out, even if I have to do a little sanding or other cleanup work before using it. I'll be sure to post results in case anyone is interested.

Just finished reading through Bob's instructions and all the other info in this thread. Thank you all for sharing your knowledge. Bob, thank you for such a great teaching tool. Your instructions were just what I needed for things to make sense. After reading through so much info in other threads and other websites I was really starting to get confused and overwhelmed about the whole edging process. Can't wait to give it a try!

Thanks for sharing these examples and your experience so far! I'm very interested in the ability to create custom stamps and so far I've found that it's difficult to get good info on the process. My dad knows little about leather working but a whole lot about routers, machining, and molds - he pointed me in the direction of laser engravers thinking it would be an easier path than CNC. It's interesting to see that the laser left a textured surface. What material did you use to make your stamps? In the next week or so, I hope to give a test run of a stamp made with a 3D printer since it's the cheapest option available to me right now.

I know this is an older topic but wanted to say thanks!! I'm totally new to leather working and Eleonore Bang's book has been so helpful! The information is great and I love that it was written so long ago but still applies. Several things she explains were terms/techniques I wasn't 100% sure I understood. Can't wait to check out the other links.