Stain Dyed Calf Skin Card Wallet

[DavidL]

There's some good advice in this thread. Specifically you can't compete with China, you'll never succeed if you try to do that, particularly hand stitching. Anyone can import a container load for a tenth of what you can make them for and if your just going to bash things out as fast as you can there isn't going to much difference between your work am mass produced stuff

To go high end you need to spend time on what you make, the details count. For eg I budget a minimum of half an hour just for the edges of a watch strap and 45 mins isn't unusual...

Yes, your right low end products are a bad decision, I'm going to focus on quality over quantity. As for your edges why not use a motorized tool, if your budget allows for it. Elfita has a wood or metal motorized burnisher for 70 USD.

Edited April 15, 2014 by DavidL

[stevieboy7]

Yes, your right low end products are a bad decision, I'm going to focus on quality over quantity. As for your edges why not use a motorized tool, if your budget allows for it. Elfita has a wood or metal motorized burnisher for 70 USD.

Motorizing =/= automatically faster and quality will drop.

If you want the best quality, you're going to do everything by hand, and take the time.

With anything in life you can have 2 of 3 things:

Price

Quality

Speed

You can have an inexpensive quality product, but it will be slow(take time).

You can have an inexpensive product fast, but quality will suffer.

You can have a quality product quickly, but it will cost money.

This is why, when you look at all of the people doing high quality items, they are doing it by hand, as price does not matter, and quality is of utmost importance.

Edited April 15, 2014 by stevieboy7

[DavidL]

Makes sense. Im not in my element here, doesn't motorized burnishing create better results than hand burnishing as the pressure is more consistent? For integrity of the product it will make a difference, but is the quality better?

In the area of quality vs speed/price

Motorized burnishing same as manual burnishing - results wise?

Hand cutting vs die cutting - do customers want to pay more for hand cutting vs die cutting?

Machine stitching vs hand stitching - I think i got a handle on this one.

Hand dying with natural dye like fruits or powders vs conventional oil dyes? (This may be influence by the target market)

everything by hand have that big of an influence vs most things are done by hand but a few areas are motorized for cost efficiency and consistency.

[cjmt]

Motorizing =/= automatically faster and quality will drop.

If you want the best quality, you're going to do everything by hand, and take the time.

With anything in life you can have 2 of 3 things:

Price

Quality

Speed

You can have an inexpensive quality product, but it will be slow(take time).

You can have an inexpensive product fast, but quality will suffer.

You can have a quality product quickly, but it will cost money.

This is why, when you look at all of the people doing high quality items, they are doing it by hand, as price does not matter, and quality is of utmost importance.

Exactly this. Your thinking about things the wrong way around. Remember you said you were going to be better than Hunio or Peter Nitz? Look at the photos of construction that Hunio in particular publishes. Do any of the steps in his work look like he's cutting corners or making things as fast as possible? Even for simple products the steps required are detailed and intricate and about making as perfect a thing as possible.

For legitimate high end work the process works like this

Theres a demand for lovely thing X

To make lovely thing X in as good a way as its possible for me to do so will take x hours

I need to buy tool x y and z

Im therefor going to charge price Z. This is an expensive price but thats because its a lovely thing

You are starting of by thinking

I want to make thing X and will charge Y because thats what I think the market is

I have to maximise profit so I have to make these as fast as possible, what can I do without it being a bit rubbish?

That works if you have a factory - you don't and your competitors do, they will eat you alive and spit out the little bits of your clicker dies....

As a not to snarky aside, the motorised gismo you recommended me is around 1/3 the price I charge for a finished watch strap - you'll offend the people here who are trying to help you if you dish out too much "advice"!

Charlie

[DavidL]

alright point taken. I just thought that as long as the core of your product is in tack, such as hand stitching, hand dying, and hand assembled that the few things are not on this list can be automated and still keep the integrity of the product as long as it doesn't hurt the end result. My point of view was that hermes, known as one of the best leather boutiques does some parts of there work by automation - like their watches are machine stitched, their saddles are mostly machine stitched and a part of their kelly bags are machine stitched and still when I look at the product It is still great at its core, since 80 percent is hand made and 20 percent is automated. But they have a huge following so they are allowed to do so. Also I'm entitled to my opinion and freedom of speech to give out any advice I see fit . Anyways, on a lighter note do you have a website cjmt I would love to see those watches . You could put it in your signature so people can see, if you have a website.

Thanks again for everyone who posted!

[cjmt]

There are some areas that can be automated and do good rather than harm. A seam can be better skived by machine than hand unless your very very good (which you should be before buying a machine, or you'll never learn). A clicking press will cut complicated shapes better than a human can on the whole. The art is knowing the best way to get the result you want - better not quicker though. Hermes largely have this, though they machine stitch too much IMHO. I have to say I think Kellys, birkins etc are fully hand stitched though.

We do have a website and do all our business through it really. I don't post it here though, this is my private account so I can say what I like without thinking about company stuff.

Couple of pictures attached. In no way are these perfect things, everything I make can always be improved in many many ways, but thats the joy of leatherwork, you can aim for perfection your whole career and never achieve it. With the exception these are hand stitched these are largely as per Hermes, Lin Cable/Barenia/Vergez Blanchard/Waxed edges etc etc

[DavidL]

very nice watch straps! barenia leather looks amazing on those straps.

[cjmt]

very nice watch straps! barenia leather looks amazing on those straps.

Thank you. Only the bottom one is Barenia, top is Vachette Natural, middle is aniline full grain veg tanned goat.

The Barenia kind of illustrates what I mean - if you want to get into the Atellier style of work you have to use the best materials, preferably famous ones and then do it justice. Hunio is another Barenia user (as is Peter Nitz) and probably does it more justice than I do, have a look through his threads

Charlie

[strudell]

Hi Charlie,

Do you have an English supplier for Barenia whom you wouldn't mind sharing?

Cheers,

S