Mablung

Resolene should work as a resist. Test it on a scrap piece to be sure. With any resist, it’s important to not leave the antique paste on too long. Most of those coatings aren’t absolutely “antique proof,” if you will, so it is important to wipe the antique off quickly if you only want it to stay in the stamp grooves. Otherwise, it dries in place and becomes more difficult to remove.

I’ve got a holster with thread and stitch holes that are grossly mismatched, and even then the thread hasn’t worked loose. Linen specifically might be a little more likely to, but properly matched thread and stitching hole sizes seem to eliminate that issue.

Happy to contribute what little I can. If I’m honest, I’ll tell you that the posts on this site are where I have learned most of what I know. There is sooo much to learn, and that’s part of the fun. You have the right attitude about it. You can also thin the dye to make it a lighter brown. This notebook cover was done with a Fiebing’s Light Brown dye, but I thinned it with denatured alcohol, about 50/50 (editing to say: might have thinned it more like 40% dye, 60% alcohol). I’ve done a couple knife sheaths with the same dye without thinning it—those turned out about the same color as the piece you showed. Yet another knife sheath was done closer to 50/50 or maybe 60/40 and got it darker than the notebook cover but lighter than the other sheaths. Thinning it made all the difference. Just another aspect to experiment with.

If you want the stamp impressions to be more obviously visible due to contrast, a lighter dye will certainly help. Darker dyes are more forgiving of the application of multiple layers to cover streaks, blots, and other mistakes, but a great part of that depends on your application method, too. Leatherwork offers innumerable rabbit holes, of which this is only one. Welcome to the hobby!

Antiquing is done after dyeing. There are a bunch of really helpful threads on here about everything dyeing and antiquing. Some people will do an overall background dye, then dye just the stamped/tooled area with another dye. Others use antique paste or even Sharpie markers. It depends on the look you want. Antique paste can be a bit messy and involves some extra steps, but it does give a nice look to certain things. Have fun learning and experimenting with all this. Look up The Leather Element videos Weaver Leathercraft puts on YouTube. The guy who presents them, Chuck Dorsett, has a couple on antiquing that I’ve found very helpful.

Kinda where I’m leaning. I think the sheepskin will make a great glasses case lining, but the cow shoulder feels like it’ll withstand the abrasion and heavier use more easily.

Title says most of the question. I’ve got a sheepskin and a cow single shoulder, both veg tan and both around 3 oz., I plan to use as lining. Sheepskin was purchased originally to line a glasses case. Then I got the single shoulder because it was a good price and useful for lots of things. Then I wondered which would be better for lining a holster I plan to make soon. All of my pistols have forward slide serrations, so I’m concerned about longevity of the lining. Veg tan the lining will be regardless, because I don’t want to use suede (due to the effects of chrome tannage and of grit getting caught up in the fibers—both are bad for a pistol’s finish). Thoughts?

Do you mean there’s not much contrast that highlights the stamp?

Hm. I get that. Screwed up the first foam pattern I made, so I made it about 15% bigger (just what that one happened to require) and went from there. You can probably fix this one by just adding some extra to the edge, cutting a new foam pattern, and tweaking the other proportions until you get it right. If you haven’t yet, also look at JLSLeather’s guide to laying out patterns. Immensely helpful.

Are you able to identify to any extent where your pattern breaks down? It’s obvious something isn’t translating properly, but likely it’s one or two things that you’re not applying or thinking through properly that are then having flow-down effects on the end product. Any idea where things start to turn left of straight, so to speak?

I think there is some that’s 3 or 3.5 mm as well. That’s what I got, as that’s quite close to 6/7 oz. leather.

Hope it works for you. It’s a few bucks well-spent and easy to work with.

Something I have found immensely helpful is making a mockup out of EVA craft foam. The “medium” thickness is right about the same as 6 oz leather, so it works very nicely for mockups to check fit, before cutting into the leather. I’ve used it to then modify my paper patterns and then used the final mockup as my tracing and cutting pattern, when I move to cutting the leather.

Had the bag been well-used? That might account for the wrinkly appearance and texture with good tooling: it was tooled when smooth and taut, then broken down over lots of use.

That’ll be good and strong, then. You know, as I look back, I see you’ve already described a good bit of this. Apologies. Looks like you have your plan down, other than deciding what to use for the gussets.

What are you using for the front and back? Separate pieces with a bottom gusset, or one piece with only side gussets?

Possibly. I tend to think the Supreme Court as currently composed would be closely divided on the subject. It’s really a question for Congress to address anyway.

Oh, I know. It just made me think of the scenario and associated legal questions presented I dealt with in my mock Supreme Court argument competition my last year of law school; my partner and I each argued an issue, and mine was whether the statutory text covers websites. So, in the interest of greatly advancing the discussion here, I shared.

Do you want it to flex more easily, so that the sides will collapse a bit if the bag is not full? If so, you can accomplish that with either thinner leather or another leather with a softer temper. The answer probably depends most on what you want the bag to do. If you want it to collapse, then a thinner/softer/thinner-and-softer leather is the right choice.

I think we’re still missing some important design details here. It sounds to me as though you’re saying you want to add a line of stitching around the whole piece, including across the back, to add some additional dimensional stability. The leather itself will likely do that on its own without punching holes through it and putting thread through it. In saying that, I’m assuming the front and sides are one single layer and you have one whole piece of leather with tabs cut that fold to the back, where all layers are sewn together, as AlZilla alluded to. I’m also assuming you’re using a reasonably heavy, thick weight of veg tan. If my assumptions and inferences are right, then all you really need to do, it would seem, is add an additional seam to the back, where you’re already sewing it, or double-stitch the existing seams. Am I missing something here? ETA: Some additional pictures, at minimum of the back, would be helpful, too.

Is this one whole piece of leather that you have sewn into the box shape? Are you trying to sew another piece into the bottom of the holster? Is this seam meant to be hidden in the back or go all the way through the front? Pinch the front and back together, or be decorative, or attach another piece somehow? Some more details of what exactly you’re trying to accomplish would be helpful.

Interesting, mostly useless factoid: It’s arguable at best that the site needs to be made ADA-accessible, because the language of the ADA has not been extended to websites by Congress, nor has the Supreme Court interpreted it to apply to websites, either. There is a split among the US Circuit Courts of Appeals that have addressed the issue regarding whether the phrase “place of public accommodation” applies to websites, rather than solely physical places. The Circuits that have held the word “place” covers websites rely on a purposivist approach to construing the text to analogize websites to the kinds of (physical) places inarguably covered, websites’ importance to most Americans’ lives now, just like physical places they need to access, and the apparent purpose of Congress to require those that accommodate the public to make their places accessible to those with disabilities. The Circuits that have reached the opposite conclusion reason that the text as enacted in 1990 and later amended in (I think) 2007 refers to physical places and physical places only, as evident from the plain, ordinary meaning of the word “place,” as understood at the time of enactment, and the examples within the statute of “places” covered are all physical places and thus do not include non-physical so-called “places”. With that bit of legal trivia, I recede again into the background… *None of this legal advice, so don’t view it as such.

I like the contrast of the black polymer with a brown holster, as long as the contrast is noticeable. Not a time to try to contrast subtly with a dark brown; then it just looks kinda dirty and weird. Double Daddy’s example above is an excellent one.

Glad to see you’re still around, even if not especially active right now. Your reasons for an absence are your own, so say no more if you don’t like.

I was afraid of that.