Saddlemaking- Opinions on Instruction

[Blake]

Hi Everyone

JUST MY OPINION HERE.

I think most Saddle Makers will agree that you will always be a student. There is simply more out there than you can learn in a lifetime. Some of us have learned to specialize and become as good as we possibly can at our choices and there is always a learning curve involved just to discover or decide on our choices.

That being said, It helps tremendously if you have at least some idea which direction you would like to go with your education and root out and simplify your approach. If you want to build working stock saddles then concentrate in that area and overlook trail or endurance saddles. Once you get established then you will have the resources and more than likely the contacts to branch into other areas if you choose.

A lot of Makers, Myself included will take on a student if he/she is sincere and willing to put the effort forward to do it right. I have always tried to work with a student so that we could work around his schedule and trust me , that can be difficult when the student is supporting a family and has bills to pay.

You can cram a saddle into one week of instruction and learn a lot but miss just as much and more because you simply overwhelm and overload yourself so try to set something up that will work with your personal learning abilities. If you work with an established Maker then I would suggest that you go in with an open mind and not cloud his instruction with information from books or other peoples opinions. There will always be contradictions in instruction from one source to another and it will be up to the student to choose the information that he/she wishes to apply and this usually comes from trial and error at the bench and in the field.

Books and tapes are great learning tools and I have a decent library myself and sometimes go to them to learn a new technique or method but that doesn't mean that it is the final say.

If you can at least spare a week to work with someone at the bench to get the basics (two would be much much better) then the books and tapes will become much more clear and you will get more out of them.

Kind Regards

Blake

[David Genadek]

I agree with Blake. In the end there is no learn how to make a saddle. You do need to get enough under your belt so you have the confidance to understand that it is a personal journey with no end. What you need to do that, is up to you. Is there any school that you can go to and walk away a saddle maker? NO

Saddle making is a practice. As you practice your skills and understanding will expand. Doctors don't do medicine they practice medicine. Lawyers don't do law they practice law. Saddlemakers practice saddle making. So you start how ever you can. If a week is what you can do now then that is a start. If it gives you enough to go home and start banging out some saddles that you can start paying your way with then it has done what it should have. Talk to everyone you can to make your decision, but if they tell you you will be a saddle maker when you are done it probable isn't a very good school. Avoid schools or teachers that have a this is the only way attitude.

There are over a 110 breeds in the US each of those has multiple diciplines and each of those has many religions with in them. Which riding philosophy do you want to learn to build for Jineta, Brida, Estriota? Are you shooting for a horizontal or vertical market?

Bottom line is that there is no mistake to be made in your choice. Whatever you do will add to your saddle practice.

David Genadek

[Hidemechanic]

Bout everything has been said about the whys and wherefores.

I also can't suggest any names, but I do suggest that when you get some names you check them out to see if their teaching style is compatable with your learning style.

I've known crafters of different mediums that are masters in their craft but not good at passing on their knowlege. "Well just do it this way!", when you can"t quite see how to fineness things to suit you or them.

I think a person's learning style is directly related to the outcome as well.

I started building saddles around 1990 (worked on many before) and my life style choices have done more to slow my advancement. Now that my kids are almost grown I am seriously considering(not quite to the point of begging my wife) asking one of our premere saddle makers here in the northwest to take me on for a week or two for some well needed fine tuning (mostly tooling). I'm also looking into a class or tutoring in art to help with my design skills.

Yes we are all students as we travel along, and even the 'masters' are still learning.

Best wishes in your travels and choices. GH

[TracyMoss]

I agree with Bruce on this one. As for Dusty Johnsons book, don't waste your time. You will be highly disappointed. However, I had already built a dozen saddles when I met him. IMO his book is a cookie cutter of a saddle, click and paste waste of time.

Edited February 4, 2008 by TracyMoss

[lazyy]

I'd been wanting to build saddles for a few years. So got to talking to some builders at a horse expo.Both agreed to teach me to build a saddle in a week for the cost of a saddle. couldnt go wrong, if nothing else i get a saddle and some knowledge.

I'm a builder by trade but was looking for a better way to express my creativity, so i went to learn. I'd deffinately say it was valuable to my getting started with saddles. I learned alot in a week ,but it got monotoneus. I had to drive 2 hrs one way each day for a week and a half. But to say the least I learned a ton in that time . The guy who taugght me mainly builds cutting and reining gear, but we built a wade. so he had to do some thinking to remember back to his last wade. That also proved valuable. The saddle turned out great but pretty heavy. I mostly watched ,took pictures, made notes and asked questions. Invaluable to be able to pick the brains of craftsman.

While me teacher sewed or was o the phone I watched bruce cheney videos, read al stohlmans books, and just looked at tooles and prviously made tack and saddles, which raised more questions. Once again truely invaluable to be able to pick the brains of a master..

So a week and a half goes by I come home with a new saddle for my spouse , a pile of photos, and notes and a dose of wavering confidence, and intentions of building my own rig. I was confident that a cabinet builder could become a saddle maker!

First course of action much to my wifes dismay was to uprade the tool chest. You can do a saddle with a little but you can do a lot better with some quality tools. Second buy al stohlmans series, there is hundreds of saddles worth of knowledge in those books , and i still reference these when I encounter problem.

We'll be fore i could build my own saddle a friend decides I should build her one. That will test your confidence ,but I had game. Of course she didnt want a wade and she had a extremely diffucult horse to fit [muttton withered wide backed] and the owner is over 6 feet tall women.

none of my patterns matched for the oregon roper tree she wanted. volume 1 stohlman. different swells, longer fenders, different skirt shape, etc. etc. a friend borrowed me gomers videos , and that helped a bit. so i scratched my had alot, took my time, tested fit , wrapped the horn 3 times, cut the seat jockey wrong [so the saddle had front jockeys now] and bought more tools. 5 months later it was done. If i can figure out how to do it i'll post a picture. I gave it a " C" . But my wife who is my biggest critic , said not bad, and it must not be it has produced 5 more orders.

A couple of saddle makers that I talked to told when I started get ready to ruin leather! And I did , But I learned by doing. Second saddle horn turned out right the first time. but had trouble covering the swell so scrapped the leather cut it from a sponggier spot , and got it right. Tooling is improving fit and finish as well. Big learning curve , but i'm pssionate about it and it doesnt seem at all like work. last night was out in the shop from noon to 10 with out food and water, just couldnt walk away!!!

Pitfalls - porly rawhided bowden saddle trees, buyin a saddle kit from bowden.

Current project homestead wade on a laporte poly tuff tree fat plate rigging 7/8 horseshoe hardware, didnt know it was made in china!, maybe inlaid padded seat, fully tooled oak leaf basket stamped combo.

Long winded!!! but this post sounds like my personal journey. I found alot of resistance from saddle makers along the way as though I was stepping on toes, but Ifound alot of help as well, thanks to those who offered free advice.

lazy y

[Duke]

as much as I promote the stohlman encyclopedia, I need to re-emphasize whatbruce has said before. al stohlman is A saddle maker, not THE saddle maker. there are lots of other resources out there. another resource for you is dusty johnsons saddle school. good luck getting into it though, as he is always booked full. I do reccommend that you buy his series of books/ dvd's though. he even has full sized patterns that you can buy. check it out.and good luck

[SaddleRider]

Just over a year ago, my neighbor who happened to own his own shoe, boot, saddle repair & custom leather shop, needed someone to come in to take care of his bookkeeping and website work and offered the jobs to me. I gladly accepted both tasks.

The following couple of weeks, I noticed that he was totally overwhelmed, what with all the custom leather work, shoe, boot and saddle repairs to the point that he was about two weeks behind on most everything in the shop. He and I sat down for lunch one day and I said, "You know, this really is a two man operation. From the looks of things, I'd say you need someone to help you out in the shop as well as the back office." He replied, "Yeah, this really is a two man operation, but my son left for a better paying job and I can't blame him for that. Are you interested in learning the craft?" "You bet I am!" I replied.

The moral of the story is, that I got the "old-fashioned apprenticeship" which few offer in this day and age. Meaning I learned shoe, boot, saddle repair & custom leather making by working in his shop with on the job training and a very small paycheck each week. The real paycheck was from the educational gains, which will pay off down the road (I hope).

Additionally, my neighbor closed his shop in November 2008, moved two hours away to semi-retire, got married and is building a new garage workshop at his new place. I've been doing it out of my home since. I do not have the industrial machines to do the boot repairs, so I mainly focus on doing custom leather & saddle repair. I do everything by hand (meaning hand-stitching everything since I don't own a machine).

While I can tear down and repair saddles (and their parts or replace the parts), I have never had the opportunity to build a custom made saddle myself, which I would like to do at some point in the future.

If I could find someone or a shop which offers or is interested in offering an "old-fashioned apprenticeship" and is reasonably close to me, so I would not have the added expense of additional accomodations, I would certainly jump at the chance to learn how to make custom saddles and work in your shop for the small paycheck and educational advancement in the field.

I think this would be a great way to bring people back to learning arts/crafts/trades which are dying as opposed to making people pay to learn it. Some can afford to pay for schooling, while others (including myself) can't.