Common Leather Myths?

[Handstitched]

18 hours ago, fredk said:

Here's 3 minutes 33 seconds you'll never get back

I seemed to have started something here...OOPS!! sorry 'bout that . 

Yep, watched that a few times over the years , it  sticks in your mind.  Ironically , I'm watching the OS all over again. I have a TV and a DVD player in my workshop . 

Aaaaaanyway.....

Back on topic.

Leather myths??  Not so much a myth, but more of  a 'beef' that p*sses  me off...."Genuine Leather" labels on belts that often  have cardboard as a filler in between , and they're sold  for $10 ???? get real !!!!!! 

 

[fredk]

$10 ? that's cheap. I've seen them in men's fashion shops for as much as £50. Not only card filler but also that plasticky smooth finish. No.1 son was going to buy one at £35 but asked me first about them. I made him a decent belt

[nstarleather]

4 hours ago, fredk said:

$10 ? that's cheap. I've seen them in men's fashion shops for as much as £50. Not only card filler but also that plasticky smooth finish. No.1 son was going to buy one at £35 but asked me first about them. I made him a decent belt

I don't normally make belts but because we're a leather shop in a small town we keep a bunch of Weaver blanks to make belts for locals...I see an Amazing amount of Walmart belts that have failed after barely any use. 

5 hours ago, Handstitched said:

 

Leather myths??  Not so much a myth, but more of  a 'beef' that p*sses  me off...."Genuine Leather" labels on belts that often  have cardboard as a filler in between , and they're sold  for $10 ???? get real !!!!!! 

 

The "genuine leather" one gets me on both sides of the myth...both the idea that the public at large don't understand that "genuine" doesn't actually mean anything in terms of quality and the other side of the coin that "genuine" means a specific low quality leather.  

There are plenty of companies and crafters who use the word "genuinely" just to mean real...I see it all the time on Reddit:  Some person usually from Eastern Europe or another non-english area posts something they've made that's obviously a very nice hight quality leather and says "I made a genuine leather 'x'" and a bunch of people who don't know better say "but "genuine" is the second worst grade of leather."     You also have Red Wing Heritage using it on nice full grain boots and Alden stamping it on their insoles...

We also got to get away with the idea the full grain is always good as well...there is a such thing as cheap full grain.  One company that people have commented to me about since I started trying to debunk both genuine and full grain is this one: https://slidebelts.com/collections/belts

You can see they offer belts in genuine, top grain and full grain leather...do you think someone doing mass production is sourcing from different tanneries and that the full grain is actually the good stuff?  I've read experiences that support that the "full grain" they use doesn't hold up.   If it's super-thin or heavily painted it doesn't matter all that much that it's full grain. 

[Tugadude]

Seems there's room for the leather industry to get together and clean up the description of grades in order to help eliminate confusion.  Adopting a global system of standards would go a long way towards helping people understand what they are buying.

But, people who want to will always be able to find ways to deceive consumers.  That part will never be fixed.

[nstarleather]

39 minutes ago, Tugadude said:

Seems there's room for the leather industry to get together and clean up the description of grades in order to help eliminate confusion.  Adopting a global system of standards would go a long way towards helping people understand what they are buying.

But, people who want to will always be able to find ways to deceive consumers.  That part will never be fixed.

I agree that getting basic definitions established legally would be great.  Full grain means "x".  Genuine means "y."  One that I go back and forth on is whether leather that's just been embossed with a pattern is full grain (if it hasn't been sanded)...SB Foot considers their embossed leather to be full grain. 

 

Unfortunately a true grading scale of quality is simply impossible because there are tons of different factors...this isn't something that will have 4 different characteristics that you can pick out to judge quality.  There are dozens of things done at the tannery that will make a leather good or not....then you have you intended use:  I love W & C Bridle leather but I challenge anyone on this site to make me a pair of gloves from it.    Horween's Chromexcel or SB Foots Copper Rough and Tough are great, but a couch made from them would leave your close waxy and stained.  I soft deer skin but it's not going into my heavy work belt...

There's also the fact that you could have lots of different leathers that are the "same" when it comes to all the descriptive words but that are better or worse depending on the tannery.  Lots of places sell leather that is meant to imitate Horween's Chromexcel and from a descriptive point of view they might be waxy pull up leathers that are combination tanned but they aren't the same  as actual CXL.   A tannery could make a firm tempered veg-tan treated "the same" as W&C Bridle but it wouldn't be...

It's like how you can "grade" beef, but you can't really grade an entire meal at a restaurant because some many things happen after the beef gets graded that the original grade plays a part but it's not really the most important.  Is it seasoned properly?  Cooked properly?  What's the preferred cooking style, could that change depending on the chef or the customer's mood?  How about  presentation?   There's also what you feel like at a given moment:  I love a fancy meal at a premium place but if I've got to pick it up on my lunch break, I'll have to make another choice.  

So there are tons of different ways to make a leather great or terrible and full grain or not is just one of those ways. 

 

 

[tsunkasapa]

4 hours ago, nstarleather said:

 https://slidebelts.com/collections/belts

I love the "vegan leather" designation. Did the animal die of natural causes? And it is STILL an animal product. LMAO

[nstarleather]

6 hours ago, tsunkasapa said:

I love the "vegan leather" designation. Did the animal die of natural causes? And it is STILL an animal product. LMAO

Technically Vegans don't want it even it it's no harm to the animal, they aren't even supposed to eat honey. 

[Handstitched]

9 hours ago, tsunkasapa said:

I love the "vegan leather" designation. Did the animal die of natural causes?

It just means the cow is a vegan  , only  eats grass, hay  & grain   

HS

[fredk]

Here 'vegan leather' is PVC plastic, aka 'leathercloth'

[nstarleather]

9 hours ago, Handstitched said:

It just means the cow is a vegan  , only  eats grass, hay  & grain   

HS

Nice!  I got someone call angry once because my site said "veg-tan" and they had read it as vegan...this is what I should have told them.