Search the Community

I've got a vegetable tanned leather desktop whose surface I'd like to harden. It was not treated before being wetted and stretched onto a desk, then rolled with a pin while wet, waxed with beeswax (melted in with a hairdyer) and finally covered with Fiebing's Leather Balsam. While I like the covering, I would like to harden the surface a bit and also see if I can make it a bit more slippery as well. I've thought about mixing together some carnauba wax with a solvent and applying that, as that would seem to be the hardest wax covering, but perhaps someone here might have a better recommendation for this application. Would removing the Fiebing's layer with saddle soap and applying an alcohol-based hardener work? I've attached a picture of the desktop surface below:

Hi: We live in the east Tennessee mountains and build some leather products that we sell on our site. It is wet here and we store our hides in a flat area that has an outside wall (concrete filled) that faces the mountain. We have noticed that some of the hides have a form of mold, especially ones that we have had for a while. Someone we know whom we sent some products to evaluate noticed that the two products they used daily were fine, but the others when left in the box formed a soft milky like substance which we are thinking is mildew or mold. Is there a way to clean these hides without damaging the leather? Thank you Chuck

Hello, I'm a jeweler working on a project making watches, and I am just beginning production on the bands themselves. I would like to work with hen leather, also known as chicken feet, which is a luxury leather in many middle eastern countries but relatively unused here in the United States. I would like to find a leatherworker who would be willing to tan chicken feet (I will attach photos of example work), which would be a similar process to tanning ostrich legs - but much smaller, of course! Vegetable tanning is a must. Any information, thoughts, or ideas would be greatly appreciated. My website is theallwatch.com if you would like to take a look at my designs. Thank you! Joslyn

I got a piece of vegetable-tanned cowhide in the mail yesterday, which I've never used before. It smelled funny, a nasty acidic chemical smell, and had a thin sticky residue on it. Being an idiot, I tried to wash the residue off with a damp cloth. Each spot on the hide that got so much as a drop of water on it now has a permanent dark stain. Even if it was a single drop that I immediately wiped up. Just rubbing a damp cloth across this leather leaves a permanent stain. I thought "tanned" always meant at least "won't be damaged by a little dampness." Is that not so for vegetable tan? Or did I get badly-tanned leather?

Hi, I'm new to this forum and part of a startup business that seeks to source and promote premier quality leather goods and craftsmanship to a wider audience. I will post a link to our site in the "new members" group. We want to educate people and help them better understand leather so they'll make informed purchasing decisions ― and we want to improve our own knowledge of leather. Those are the main reasons I am now a member here on Leatherworker. We have just finished an article about vegetable vs chrome tanning. I would be most grateful if some of you experts would spare 5 minutes, read through it and comment on it. If you have suggestions for changes or adding more information to the article, please let me know. Thanks!! Anders -- Tanning leather: Chrome or vegetable? The leather that your bag is made of has been tanned. And no, that doesn’t mean that it has been left in the sun to get a bit of colour. Basically, tanning is the process that converts animal skin to leather. How this process is carried out has a very significant impact on the quality of the bag you hope to use for years to come. Will it soften and acquire a patina over time? Or will it look the same until one day it starts to crack? Once an animal skin has been turned into a hide by being degreased and having all its hair removed, the tanning process can begin. An untreated skin would both harden and putrefy as it is an organic material. So, the aim of the tanning process is to prevent this from happening – to turn the hide into leather. This is something human beings have been doing for a very long time. Some evidence suggests that leather tanning was performed as far back as approximately 6,000 BCE in the Indus Valley – one of the cradles of modern civilization. The basic principle has been the same for all these millennia: To modify the protein called collagen, which the skin is made up of. You can actually get a sense of this protein with the naked eye. Collagen molecules like to first line up and then to twist together into “fibre bundles“, that you can easily see if you look closely enough at quality leather. Look closely and on vegetable tanned leathers you will be able to see the collagen fibres that leather is made up of. What tanning does is leave the skin much less susceptible to hydrolysis – the separating of chemical bonds caused by water – which would otherwise cause its degradation. Tanning modifies the molecular structure of the skin. Vegetable tanning For the vast majority of the past thousands of years this modification has been performed by soaking the skin in a solution made up of vegetable tannins. These tannins would most often come from trees such as oak, chestnut or mimosa, but hundreds of tree types and other plants have been used. In fact, the word ‘tannin’ derives from an old German word for ‘fir’. So ‘tanning’ has nothing to do with colouring as in getting your kit off and letting the sun brown your skin. A tannin is a molecule that bonds easily with proteins and will draw liquids out. If you are a wine drinker, you may have had heated debates over a wine’s ‘tannins’ – the ingredient that makes the wine feel dry in the mouth, sometimes to the extent of making both your tongue and gums feel unpleasantly arid and barren. Just as the tannins in wine come from the skin of the grape, the tannins in trees are found in the bark. When tanning hides to make leather, the hides are soaked in a tanning solution. The tannin molecules will enter the hide and displace the water that is bound in the collagen. The water is drawn out, but as the tannins take the place of the removed water, the leather does not grow inflexible as fully dehydrated leather otherwise would. It may sound easy, but it isn’t. The process is complex and the skins require multiple treatments over a period of up to two months in order for the water molecules to be fully extracted and letting the tannin molecules take their places in just the right way. A lot of work from skilled craftsmen is involved too. Mineral (chromium) tanning The complexity, expense and time involved with tanning with vegetable tannins led to the development of using mineral tanning agents instead. The basic principle is the same, removing water molecules from the collagen and replacing them, but the process is much quicker using chrome which by far is the most popular mineral tanning agent today. The whole process can be automated and finished in a day. The process, however, is far less natural than when using vegetable tannins. It involves first placing the hides in acidic salts to better make the chrome fit in between the collagen molecules – and then returning the hides to a normal pH level. This requires the use of acids and other chemicals as well as the chromium sulphates themselves. All these have a negative environmental impact and the industry is under increasing pressure to “clean up”. As opposed to the vegetable tanned variety, chrome tanned leather can’t be recycled either as it is not truly a natural product. Nevertheless, today no less than about 90% of the world’s leathers are chrome tanned – primarily due to the cost. If you buy wholesale leather, vegetable tanned leathers cost about three times as much as chrome leathers. In general, vegetable tanned leather is considered far superior to chrome leather. Look, feel and smell The cost and environmental impact of chrome and vegetable tanned leathers are not the only differences between the two. There are more visible distinctions too. Vegetable tanned leather Because of the way it is tanned, the colours of vegetable tanned leather will be richer and “deeper” and the leather will appear, as it is, natural. Being an entirely organic material, vegetable tanned leather will change over time. It will grow softer and darker, and will acquire a patina depending on its uses. As it is more durable, vegetable tanned leather will last longer than chromium leather – potentially several lifetimes. Bags that are decades old can be highly sought after items. Vegetable tanned leather scratches fairly easily, but unlike chrome leather, scratches can easily be buffed out. Vegetable tanned leather smells natural – the pleasant, sweet smell you probably associate with leather is the smell of vegetable tanned leather. Chrome tanned leather Chrome tanned leather looks a little as if it has been painted – the fibres of the leather not being allowed to show through the way they do on vegetable tanned leather. It is basically a less natural product. Chrome tanned leather will not develop a patina but will continue to look pretty much like it did when it was purchased. Chrome tanned leather will initially be softer and suppler than vegetable tanned leather but will not age well. Over time it will grow prone to breakage. Chrome tanned leather is more resistant to water, stains and extreme heat. Chrome tanned leather will have a slight chemical smell to it. Sometimes disguised by the producer artificially scenting the leather. HOT TIP Blue chrome The chrome tanning process will turn the hides light blue. As they are subsequently dyed, the blue will no longer be visible on the surface of the finished leather. But the leather will later be cut into the pieces needed to sew, say, a bag, and the edges of these individual cuts will show a blue tint. Most producers will use a special paint to paint the edges, but if you see any trace of blue edges, the leather in your hands has definitely been chrome tanned.

I'm looking for 3/4 inch wide strips of veg-tan leather at 8/9 oz thick for dog leads. Basically, I need them the length of a side. I would definitely be interested in buying a side of my own, but my client may not be able to buy as many as I would need her to buy in order to make buying a side worth it. I've worked at a Tandy, and they don't have anything longer than 72 inches, and that just won't work. Are there any other suppliers that you folks know of that would sell me side-length strips that aren't crazy expensive? I don't care if they aren't trimmed down to a standard length or not. I figured I need the strip to be about 80+ inches. I would also love it if this were a constant supplier with constant pricing.

I would like to attempt to make the following tote bag as a first project/gift. http://www.whippingpost.com/collections/totes/products/the-vintage-tote-bag I contacted the site and found out that they use a 5/6 oz veg tan leather, and copper rivets. Here is where the guidance comes in... In being new, i need to know the following: Where should i source the leather from? How do I finish to obtain these results/color? Where do i purchase the hardware/stitching material? Also, anything that you can think of that may help me in the process of creating this bag Thank you all, and what a terrific forum. Matt

Hello! A few months ago my local leather supplier switched over to buying from a new tannery. I have noticed that the new leather does not patina, it just ends up looking kind of dirty after a few months of use. I have been working with 8/9 oz Veg Tan leather for about 4 years now and I have never encountered pieces like these. This isn't a problem for products that I dye but it is for products that I leave natural. I love watching the natural leather age and darken but this new leather just doesnt seem to do that. I also put it to the test with a few products that I use to see how it would react. I tested some Skidmores leather cream and some saddle oil on a few natural pieces. My local supplier was out of the 8/9 oz for a few weeks so I had to go out to buy a Hermann Oak piece from another supplier as that is all that they carried, of course Hermann Oak leather tanned and reacted nicely. I am wondering if anyone has ever experienced this? Is there something that leather could have been coated with? I spoke to my supplier about it and they said it isnt coated with anything and are surprised that it is not getting its natural patina. You can see that the new leather had some spotting once I put the saddle oil on it. Any information would help!