Saradamon

Ah, but that's just it. I don't quite think I need the welts if it's riveted ;P Those are very nice. Identifying what the welt is though has confirmed for me that... I prefer my way. I didn't realize THAT was the welt. I... honest am not a fan of how those look. Of course I'll use such if it's the only option or if it's ordered as such, but otherwise I'll probably continue to avoid it. I do, however, know how to do saddle stitches. Usually I just stick with stitching awl because it's a lot faster and easier. Thanks! Yea, rivets are probably my style. That and stuff made with leather far heavier weight than needed... (ie the herbalist bag). And funny story, originally the saddlebag was going to basically be a leather chest, with edge flanges and the like. But then the customer brought in a friends' smaller bag and asked for it to be styled like it, so I modified the initial design to what it became.

Key word being "properly". Never tried a welt before, and only effectively been practicing leatherwork for about 6 months.

Because of how the rivets compress the leather together near the edge, the blade wont ever reach the rivets. The leather around the rivets will press against the sides of the blade before that happens. And yes, I definitely should make patterns, and for most stuff I do. For one-off knife sheathes though, I tend to just wing it. I'll do a rough (very very rough as my talent at drawing can't quite be called such) sketch of what I think it should look like, and a dimensioned not-to-scale outline of what pieces to cut out, and then just make it. In total it probably took about an hour per sheath for the smaller two and it was like 3 hours for the big one (should have been just over 1 hour, but I wasn't getting the edges to slick like I wanted them and had to fix quite a few simple mistakes across it.) I haven't really tried stitching for the actual pocket of the sheath (though the belt loops were stitched on on the smaller two), mainly because I prefer the look of rivets, trust them more, and it's faster to set them than to stitch it. It's also just more fun to set rivets, in my opinion. Also, given what I said above about the rivets keeping the blade away, I'm not quite sure if hand stitching would get enough tension to simulate that, so I'm worried about the blade eventually cutting out the stitching (I also don't like the thought of liners). Sure, if I got an order for one that's stitched, I'd do it, but I'd probably pop a few rivets in to reinforce it, just in case.

I keep forgetting that I signed up here a while back. Might as well get caught up with stuff I've made. So... uh.... Knife sheathes! I've done some of those. First one I made, for a knife a coworker of mine had. Scrap leather the guy I apprenticed under gave me for a pair of bracers (further down). and these two: For a Tops Buck Nighthawk. Guy wanted two of them "just in case". Probably should have made a template so the two were identical, but it's good practice (I think) to make them both from scratch on their own. Right? (sobbing) since I mentioned them, Bracers! Made these for my girlfriend's dad for Ren Faire use. As well, a few weeks ago I made this one for a costume: It fit very well. Comfortable to wear, but when I released the clasps it practically launched itself off. Bracers too big? What about bracelets? I... uh... I have no idea where those snaps could have come from.... *cough* oh, that's better. Turquoise on the first one, Onyx on the second. Remember that costume I mentioned, well it was McCree from Overwatch, for whom I also made all this stuff. As well as This dopey, oversized hat that I still need to finish the edge on. Was a first try at a hat though, so... well, almost all the stuff I made was a first try.... anyway, what else could be left? well, from the same leather as the hat, I made a pouch for a usb power bank to keep my phone charged at conventions I'd wear the above costume to: Fancy. Also working on a bag for my GF's herbalist Ren Faire garb: Recognize the leather? Tandy's latigo remnants. Notice the mistake I made in not skiving the edge at all? This thing here taught me that I should do that. It also gave me plenty of experience in replacing busted rivets. Finally, that bag is nice, but what about a bigger one? What about, say... A saddle bag!? This thing was so much larger than anything else I'd tried, and it took up a quarter of a side of a Water Buffalo hide. It's the same leather that would also be used for the longer bracer I made myself. bonus image of it in use: someone save me from this maelstrom of too-many-Self-Imposed-Projects, and let me know what you think. Also, if the pics take up too much space, I'll revert them to just links. Let me know about that ASAP. Thanks! -Joe PS: Feel free to criticize. I know plenty well about different issues with every single one of these, but knowing others I didn't notice would help! PPS: (or is is PSS? idk) Any stitching is hand stitching using a stitching awl, just to let you know.