Skull Handbag

[Urban Goth]

So have just had a couple of days of making a mask with rawhide over the weekend at the New Zealand Leather Conference, had never worked with it before so was an interesting few days. While doing that I thought I would have a go at making a skull handbag out of rawhide and lining it was thin leather etc. So I thought I would do a few photos as I went along. Here the first 4, took about 15 minutes to get this far. Will let it dry for a while and do a bit more, the rawhide is very floopy at the moment and doesn't hold a lot of shape.

[King's X]

That's wicked!

[MADMAX22]

Very cool.

Those photos seem like they should be in the opposite order, atleast for a horror flick they would be lol.

[Timd]

I love it! Can't wait to see more.

[Urban Goth]

Hey guys thanks for the comments.

So have been working on and off on it for about an hour now, (started it about 5 hours ago though, have to let the rawhide dry to get it to hold its shape better), and have given it a trim up to get rid on the major excess around it. I won't be trimming it up anymore until it is finished.

So have finished the back fairly much but have to let it dry further to do the finishing touches to the shaping at the bottom. The sides are coming along well as well.

So the face is the major part I have left to work on, I have stuffed the eye sockets and behind the jaw with news paper to hold the raw hide in place. As you can see from the last 2 picture of the eyes that it works really well. Will work on it for a little bit more tonight and wrap it in a wet towel and put it in the fridge to keep it moist, have no idea how this will work but the whole thing is a learning process.

[MADMAX22]

Coming along very nicely. That stuff is almost to realistic looking, its kind of creepy but I gotta keep checking it out lol.

Hope it all works out for ya in the end.

[Urban Goth]

A bit more background on this project, this is being done with lamb rawhide if I remember rightly from the class on Saturday. If you haven't used this before, it will go from this nice light colour like it is a the moment, to probably quite a weathered brownie streaky white, which you can see in the last photo of a shell I did the other day out of the same bit of rawhide.

So did another 20 minutes on the skull, have stuffed it with more news paper to get some shape in around the jaw. There is now 2 flaps at the back of the head, this will be cut off at a later time and stitched back together. This has to be done anyway as I'm going to have to cut the rawhide off the skull once it is dry.

Want to end up with 3 bits of rawhide, will cut the top of the skull off first to make the lid, then cut the back off to remove the rest of the skull. Then will cover the inside with red lambskin and put a leather base on the bottom and stitch the whole thing back together.

Anyway this lot of work was stuffing it more with news paper round the jaw to start getting more shape to it, have started stuffing some of the flaps of extra rawhide in around the jaw as well to try and hide some of it, this can be worked a lot to make it thinner as I get further along, but am trying to get the basic shape right first.

Still working on the top of the skull as well trying to get more of the carving to come out on the rawhide when its dry. So that's day 1 over wit, its now in the fridge wrapped in a wet towel.

Edited April 18, 2010 by Urban Goth

[leatheroo]

great project....cant wait to see it finished...love the shell. I really wanted to attend the NZ conference but couldnt afford it this year...saving the dollars for the Dimensions in leather in Queensland next year..........will you be going ??????????????

[Urban Goth]

So its been a few days since the last post and the skull's just been sitting in the fridge in a wet towel, had a bit of free time this afternoon so pulled it out and did some trimming and finished molding the rest of it. Also put a coat of Fiebings white die on it when it was still wet to make it a bit whiter, will give it a few more coats as it dries and will take the newspaper out of the eyes etc.

Sorry the pictures aren't as good, the good camera is at the shop at the moment.

[Urban Goth]

great project....cant wait to see it finished...love the shell. I really wanted to attend the NZ conference but couldnt afford it this year...saving the dollars for the Dimensions in leather in Queensland next year..........will you be going ??????????????

Probably not coming over, moving hopefully in the next few months and probably won't be able to get time off from new job.

[mugwump]

very cool looking... kinda creepy... but cool... good luck...

eric

[ShirleyT]

on pins and needles...can't wait! Thanks for sharing this project. wow!

[Britkk]

I'm hoping this thread can be revived - I want to see the final piece!

[shtoink]

I'm hoping this thread can be revived - I want to see the final piece!

Same here!

I'm scratching my head as to how I missed this thread in all the time I spent digging around in the older stuff...

[ReneeCanady]

Wow, that's really crazy! I would love to see the finished product as well.

PS: The horror story comment was hilarious.