Glazing Natural Leather By Hand

[KGV]

Hi all!

Haven't posted in a while, life gets in the way of leather working sometimes, haha. I'm getting back into leathercrafting and I saw some crazy stuff recently, glazed natural leather. I looked for some to order but the only one I've found is from japan and the shipping outweighs the cost of the leather, so I started to look into hand glazing it myself. I've seen a few people that have done it but they keep their process secret, which left me at a dead end. If anyone here has ever done it or can point me in the right direction as to where to find techniques, materials, and tutorials I'd be extremely grateful!

Thanks all!

Best Regards,

Kevin

[DavidL]

I know waterhouse leather has glazed leather at 15 dollars a sq foot and they thin for free. leather glazing I've only seen on youtube and it was done on a big machine that moves back and forth(could of been heated) and I don't think they used any oils or liquids. Maybe a slicker with cotton wrapped around it may work? I also have had cheap transparent glue end up on dyed vegtan and it looked shiny so you may want to try that but I don't want to lead you in the wrong direction or mess up a lot of leather so try it on some scrap first.

[KGV]

Thanks for the information! I'll look into it, I've got scrap lying around so i'll try that, I've no clue what else could be used, maybe a heated wax of some sort? I'm going to try everything I can, thanks for your contribution David!

Kevin

[DavidL]

heres a video if you haven't seen it with the machine for reference

[KGV]

Thanks David!!!

[Hi Im Joe]

Have you thought about a boxwood burnisher. I think you could duplicate that result with something like that. Valerie Michael references one in her book. It just looks like a lump of boxwood with a handle carved out on one end...basically the shape of the head of that machine in the video David posted. You could definitely rub it onto the leather and get some burnished or glazed effect.

Good luck! I want to see the results.

[KGV]

Helps a lot joe! I'm going to get a cheap one and try it out! That video is insane and aside from using some cloth to rub across the surface, the boxwood burnisher seems like my best bet. Thanks to both of you!

[Hi Im Joe]

Good luck man! Can't wait to see what you come up with.

[DavidL]

Im with joe on this one, I'm interested in what you come up with.

[jk215]

Im actually going to be giving this a go myself in the next few weeks. There are very few resources online and almost none that involve hand glazing. The only info you will find is about using a glazing jack like in the video above but thats not practical for small scale use. I tried locating a "glass rod" heavy enough to maybe mimic the action of a glazing jack but I dont think I could leverage enough pressure to be effective. So I settled for a glass burnisher from Tandy that I just got delivered. I know leatherworkers who do a lot of tooling use them to glaze the surface before casing. I think combining this action with some hand stuffing should make some really nice glazed leather. Im going to attempt hand hot stuffing with some waxes, tallows, oils and glazing after that. Ill try to remember to post my results. Good luck!

Edited August 26, 2014 by jk215

[DavidL]

I was looking for screen printing supplies and I saw a t shirt heat press that would work on leathers with waxes and oils or adding them onto vegtan.

Could we worth a chance but may not work. Around 230 on amazon.com.

Helps a lot joe! I'm going to get a cheap one and try it out! That video is insane and aside from using some cloth to rub across the surface, the boxwood burnisher seems like my best bet. Thanks to both of you!

Im actually going to be giving this a go myself in the next few weeks. There are very few resources online and almost none that involve hand glazing. The only info you will find is about using a glazing jack like in the video above but thats not practical for small scale use. I tried locating a "glass rod" heavy enough to maybe mimic the action of a glazing jack but I dont think I could leverage enough pressure to be effective. So I settled for a glass burnisher from Tandy that I just got delivered. I know leatherworkers who do a lot of tooling use them to glaze the surface before casing. I think combining this action with some hand stuffing should make some really nice glazed leather. Im going to attempt hand hot stuffing with some waxes, tallows, oils and glazing after that. Ill try to remember to post my results. Good luck!

[thefanninator]

Have you thought about a boxwood burnisher. I think you could duplicate that result with something like that. Valerie Michael references one in her book. It just looks like a lump of boxwood with a handle carved out on one end...basically the shape of the head of that machine in the video David posted. You could definitely rub it onto the leather and get some burnished or glazed effect.

Good luck! I want to see the results.

Yes, Joe is right. In the video they are just burnishing the leather. As Joe said Valerie Michael mentions it in her book. If you don't own the book, you should.

Edited August 29, 2014 by thefanninator

[PRLeatherworks]

Looks like this thread hasn't had any attention for a while but since I'm looking into this process as well, I thought I would share this link in case anyone is interested. Haven't had a chance to try it yet but I'll post the results when I do. 

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/leather-glazed-105873.html 

[kiwican]

lol I did this by accident when I first started leather work, I used the plastic slicking wheel 

[kiwican]

Take a look at this video, lots of history here and a bit about what you are asking about 

[sgrand]

I'm a newby here. Glad I came across this post.  I need to glaze fairly large pieces of leather.  The glass slicker shown in videos I found below do a good job but it's slow  going.  I thought. is there a way to get a glass cylinder on a drill?  Anyone know of such a thing.  Slotted hardwood gizmos on drills are used for edge burnishing.  Guess I could find a way to put a larger wood cylinder on a drill -- not exactly sure how.  Probably won't work as well as glass.  Any suggestions would be appreciated. Much Thanks

 

 

[Chef niloc]

I know this is a pretty old thread, but since there still doesn’t seem to be a lot of information out there on the subject, I thought I’d add something I’ve come across over the years. The machine. The OP is talking about uses “pressure” and “friction” to do its job. What do those two things (pressure & friction)  produce? You guessed it heat! The glass hand slickers posted above work 1000x better if working on a hard flat very warm surface.  I put a granite stone. (like what you use the stamp on) in the bottom of a gas oven that’s off ( so just the pilot flame) , electric oven lowest setting would probably work. The thick stone holds the heat for a good amount of time. I’m sure there are lots of ways to achieve this though. Very Important part regarding heat. To hot you will kill/ destroy the leather. I like to call it uncomfortably warm to the touch. In other words, I can place my hand flat on it and leave it there without burning myself, but it’s not exactly comfortable.

 

hopefully that helps someone someday.