Mablung

Using leather from the back portion of the hide will help mitigate that, as will orienting the grain to resist stretching. The stitching process itself can induce some stretch and probably won’t prevent stretching. It may prevent a little bit of lateral stretching, across the body of the strap, but I wouldn’t think it would do anything about longitudinal stretching, along the length of the strap.

The Economy leathers in particular are susceptible to inconsistent thickness grading. The manager of my local store said whoever grades them tends to go with whatever the thickness is at a given spot on the hide and assigns it a somewhat wide range, since they don’t try very hard on the cheap ones. I have a Craftsman double shoulder with a great surface and even grain marked 7-9 that I swear is anywhere from 7 to at least 10.

I will certainly do that. I found some books on archive.org on shoemaking that I downloaded a while back, but I need to find the files. Wonderful resources. Now I gotta get some tools on eBay (found a set of a couple hammers, last jack stand and a few iron lasts, some awls, and a couple other tools I don’t recall for $99 plus $55 shipping—tempted but haven’t decided to pull the trigger yet) and some shoes from Goodwill to practice on.

Great stuff, @Tastech. Looking forward to your other words of advice. I’ve read up on cobbler’s tools and looked on eBay enough to have some notion of what the various tools are, but I don’t know which ones are truly essential and which ones are not. I also see a variety of styles of curved awls and, as you pointed out, hammers. That there are different patterns and numbers associated with various ones within a pattern set is easy enough to see when scrolling through eBay listings, but I don’t understand their different uses. So, pictures of your tools would be much appreciated indeed. In a somewhat similar vein, I have seen some videos of people stitching soles with a jerk needle, others with a speedy stitcher sewing awl, and some other techniques I can’t recall. What’s your preferred method? And, I agree entirely about the “sneaker generation,” being squarely a product of it. I like my various lightweight synthetics for certain purposes, but I also buy “barefoot” shoes that end up being pretty expensive, especially in relation to their relatively short lifespan. I wanted a chukka-style (or vellie, if you prefer) short boot to wear to work but wasn’t willing to pay a semi-bespoke maker over $1000 for a pair. Assuredly, those are much better than the ones I make, but I decided to learn to make my own instead. So, here I am, having made kinda ugly but very comfortable and mostly functional shoes. I also just like having something that can be repaired, last, and is something I made myself. I’m an attorney by profession, and it is rare that I can point to something and say, “Hey, I did that! I made that thing!” Leatherwork is thus quite satisfying, especially when I can point to something like a shoe.

Huh. That’s an interesting conundrum. Which is to say, I don’t know what the answer is, although that may simply be because I haven’t tried to dye chrome tan leather; all the chrome tan I’ve dealt with is already colored the color I wanted. Could it be that the chemistry of chrome tanning prevents the hide from holding dyes? I don’t know the chemical makeup of the Angelus pro dyes, but I know the Fiebing’s pro dyes are spirit-based, allowing them to penetrate veg tan more effectively. That tells me there’s some manner of chemical reaction going on there, which may not play well with chrome tannage. I’m just spitballing/thinking out loud, in case one thought or another turns out to be helpful.

How did you dye the hides? Airbrush, daubers, etc.? Were the hides sealed before you dyed them? Few more specifics on the hides’ pre-dye condition and your methods would be helpful.

I have heard the CEO can be made to boil over somewhat easily over issues she gets personally invested in. Don’t know what that will mean for the growth of the company, but I have gotten the sense from my local guys that some changes have been made a little precipitously. Hopefully that won’t translate into other hasty business decisions, but it sounds like she’s concerned about cost-saving to protect the bottom line. Not a bad thing in itself, but if that becomes the primary objective, then other business objectives suffer.

I may need to try giving my dog carrots. Never thought of that. It’d be better for her gut than the amount of rawhide she goes through otherwise.

Couldn’t possibly want to use the resources God actually gave us, instead of the ones we want to create for ourselves, huh? That sparks a thought. It seems human hubris (if not something palpably evil) is demonstrated in such a mentality that inverts what is good and what is not. God made animals, gave them to us for food and their skins for clothing, yet now the prevailing line amongst those who have the microphone is that those things are abusive, disgusting, and unhealthy, whereas humanly-synthesized plastics and other synthetics are what are really safe for us and the planet. We try so very hard to be God that we ignore and even outright reject His good gifts to us, including in the form of leather. This twaddle about all things non-leather being better makes me want to go make another pair of shoes just to really show them. All that said, synthetics have their place. Once I get good enough, I plan to make a pair of tall hunting boots using a Vibram lugged sole. Synthetic materials are useful. They’re just not the answer to some made-up ethical dilemma posed by using leather, or the ecological savior (quite the opposite).

A few questions for you. What are, in your mind, the essential steps in polishing a shoe? You may have meant simply that no one under 40 knows how to select, apply, and buff a shoe polish, which really isn’t hard to do, but I just wonder what else you think is necessary to really polish a shoe well. For someone getting started cobbling, what tools are essential? Outsole stitchers, sanding machines, so on are all helpful labor-saving devices, but what is truly essential to getting going in the craft? What do you consider a high-quality shoe that would get you to work on it? I’ll use a couple of my shoes as comparison jumping-off points. I have a pair of Johnston & Murphy Oxfords I bought for $100 or so on sale close to ten years ago—I think the outsole is either cemented or has a closed stitching channel, but I’m not sure which. I also have a pair of Wolverine 1000 Mile boots that are Goodyear welted with open-channel stitching. Would you decline to work on either one, and why? I have taken an inordinate interest in making and repairing shoes, so I may have more questions for you, if you’re willing to take a little time to answer.

What a beautiful dog! I love GSDs. I have a Husky/GSD mix that looks much more like a GSD, and she’s wonderful. Fortunately, not as capable of destroying things as your dog.

Dang! Sorry to hear that. That really sucks. I’d feel high and dry if my local Tandy closed, and I’d sink a lot of money into materials as well. That’s really too bad, Sheilajeanne.

Time to become one’s own cobbler, right?

Awfully nice bag. She looks happy with it (and she’s awfully pretty, too).

I have a pair of wolverine boots that need to be resold. Watching that video got me thinking that I could probably manage to do it myself. I found a last Jack on eBay for a good price, which I might grab so that I can start doing some more advanced shoe making and repair work. if everything goes to hell in a handbasket, at least I will be able to make and repair shoes.

Might try it on a scrap piece. Put some Hi-Lite on it, let it dry, then paint over.

Did you seal it with something like Resolene? Or does Hi-Lite color and seal both?

@LeatherDoofus’s recent threads made me look up some directions about making turn shoes and adapting them to other styles similarly to his (her?) method. Found this guide that looks really helpful and thought I’d share with everyone. http://www.aidan-campbell.co.uk/PDFs/Guide to Viking turnshoes.pdf

Okay, so it sounds like you pre-punch the holes and then stitch from the inside. Got it. That makes sense. I was proceeding on the assumption you were cementing the exterior half-soles, then punching, but I think I got that reversed. Again, appreciate your sharing your methods here. I like learning all this stuff and am always looking to learn from someone who has already gotten a good method in place, so I appreciate your answering my questions! And to the extent something is proprietary, since you want to make and sell your shoes around Nashville, feel free to keep some things back. This group is generally about sharing knowledge and methods, but that hardly obligates you to share all things, either.

How do you stitch on the half-soles? It appears they’re Blake stitched, but I’m not sure. I’m trying to figure out how to replicate that by hand, because that’s a neat design, but I only have hand tools and no plans to get a cylinder arm or dedicated Blake stitch machine.

Okay, that’s pretty cool. Thanks for sharing. I would love to see a sketch. Thinking I need to revisit turn shoes again.

Man, my mouth is watering for some brook trout from mountain streams. Best fish I have ever had were brook trout my dad and I caught in the Hoover Wilderness in the Sierra Nevada Mountains almost 11 years ago. Wild-caught trout from a relatively clean environment were just fabulous.

That’s pretty cool. You mind sharing a few pictures from different angles? I’m especially interested in the side seams and how the upper is attached.

Hope you'll contribute in the shoemaking forum. I've been working on making shoes and only made a couple so far, but I'd like to get into making more complex, sturdier models. Welcome to the forum! I grew up outside of Nashville. Find the right market to advertise to, and you can likely sell some of the shoes you're describing. Though, I will say, turnshoes do seem to somewhat limit the designs you can create. Even in Nashville, slightly more conventional designs might get a little more attention. Just a thought.

Nearly anything will work. Nearly anything will get stained and show dings. I have a piece of SB Foot utility side I use on my desk. Hearty stuff, and it shows dings, sweat, etc. If you don’t want to use an acrylic coating of some kind or chrome tan with a plastic-y top coating but want greater water resistance and a full grain, a Crazy Horse would work. Just think about what might go on the desk that you would not want to take up some of the pigments or waxes in the pad. Some people use veg tan to tool designs on a standalone mouse pad (rather than a full desk pad like it appears you have in mind), then seal it with Resolene or another acrylic sealer.