Subterra

Over the past 25+ years I have made literally 1000s of patches for bikers. The numbers on the photos are an approximate count of sales. The epoxy plates I make from my original toolings made it all possible. The Longhorns, Pirate, and Abate were commissioned patches. The Celtic Cross, Eagle Flag, and POWMIA are my originals. These are just a very few of many different designs I have produced. Dan Sines, Leather Artist

I haven't seen anything on this site of someone doing this... This is a proven method I have been doing since the 1990s and have created well over 50 plates. The material I use is extremely tough and I have pressed out literally 1000s of biker patches from my plates. Some are as big as 10" x 11" in size. These were not simple to make when I started making them with lots of trial and error, many pitfalls, and ruining some of my original toolings along the way. The process is too lengthy to put in here, but well worth the effort if you have a tooling you want to duplicate. The photos show the plate, the pressing, and the staining process. In my previous submission with the sculptures, the green leaves on the roses are pressed out from a plate made from an original tooling. The dragonfly is also pressed out from a plate. Enjoy! Dan Sines, Leather Artist

I am calling what I do "bending leather"... Not sure what category these will fit into. What inspired me to try this is because of the brilliant colors I get from Waterstain. It is so simple to work with and most of these parts are dipped into a diluted color or color mix of Waterstain. I mostly just buy the three primary colors, black and pearl and mix them as I need. Wish someone locally was interested in this form of art because I would love to teach them how to do this. The most fun recently is the two colored rose pedals. The process never stops fascinating me. Enjoy the pics! Dan Sines, leather artist

I have always loved this machine because once I had it serviced and adjusted for poly thread and the tips on the bobbin shuttles added to due to wear, it worked well for 1,000s of biker patches I sewed on. We also had two Singer 29-4 machines but my first love has been this machine. My wife and I literally earned this machine by riding and helping on summer camp trail rides at a summer horse camp. It was gathering dust in the tack room. It is nice to know the model is a 17??? I was told at one time that it was built around the mid 1880's... is that correct? In the 25 years of owning this machine, I have discovered the most important thing to do is to keep it lubed. It will also start skipping stitches and wadding up the thread from the bobbin under the project if you don't keep it lubed. Also due to using poly thread these days, the loop piece just to the left of the oiler ended up cut clear through and had to be replaced and I actually manufactured a new one out of a coat hangar. The top eye also was being cut through by the poly so I found a couple of inserts made of ceramic to stop the cutting of the thread. Like my grandpa used to say... "if it ain't movin' grease it." I totally agree! Don't know what this machine is worth these days, but is is a gem.

Yes it is leather with a piece of fine wire in the center to keep it stiff enough. The rest of the flower is all leather.

This old dog has learned some new tricks over the past several years and I thought it would be a good idea to put them out here. My handle "Subterra" comes from a very unique root cellar... in case you are wondering. I am in my 60's and have been tooling leather since I was in the Navy and started tooling leather in 1975 after being coached by a Texan on board the USS Enterprise. Wouldn't even take a guess on how many projects I have made over the years... but the last 15-20 years have been working more as a leather artist. I started making leather patches for bikers. One of my own designs started selling like crazy and I needed to figure out how to do multiples of the same design without all the tooling time. I ultimately ended up using an epoxy to make a plate and have made between 50-60 plates of my own designs as well as for biker organizations. In the past four years I ended up being hired by a large organization to produce six different patch designs and have probably produced over 1000 of each design using the plates made from my original tooling. The new trick comes in when learning how to use one of the new products Tandy sells called Waterstain. It is by far the most colorfast stain I have ever used... it doesn't run in the rain, nor fade in the sun. HERE'S THE BEST PART... I had bags and bags of scraps from making the patches so one day it occured to me that with the Waterstain I could probably make a rose. Since then I have made many many roses from my scraps as well as sculptures. They all sell well. Hope you enjoy the photos of some of my leather art. Subterra/Dan