Handmade machine stitched?

[YinTx]

1 hour ago, bikermutt07 said:

Did you put your heart into it?

I donno about that.  seems to make it even more vague.  

The farmer that drives his plow and reaper all day and all night... he put his heart into it.  Handmade wheat?

YinTx

[bikermutt07]

1 hour ago, nstarleather said:

I've cut myself the last few times I did a batch of totes, does that count?

Well, hell yeah!

1 hour ago, YinTx said:

I donno about that.  seems to make it even more vague.  

The farmer that drives his plow and reaper all day and all night... he put his heart into it.  Handmade wheat?

YinTx

Yep, totally handmade wheat. I have seen your work. I know you put your heart into it.

[RockyAussie]

5 hours ago, nstarleather said:

I've cut myself the last few times I did a batch of totes, does that count?

A blood spot to show hand made???? I guess that will slow down the mass production items a bit or the craftspersons.

 

[RockyAussie]

38 minutes ago, nstarleather said:

It was a run of 40 of them...had to make sure I couldn’t be accused of “mass production”

Ha Ha ...thats 40 drops of blood . What the hell ....Key tags are are not going to be any fun. I'll check out the local blood bank first ....

[rodneywt1180b]

14 hours ago, nstarleather said:

 

It's all marketing, as soon as a "critical mass" of real artisans start using any term it will get copied by the lower quality mass produced stuff (as well as, let's say, "less-skilled" hobbyists who start a garage business before they have the leather-working chops to do so).

 

Currently on the leather side of things I am that "less skilled" hobbyist w/o the leather working chops, though I am trying to learn.  I don't think the real leather workers here have much to fear from me.

[rodneywt1180b]

I know in the short time I've been here I've learned a lot.  I still have a long way to go.  First thing I learned was it isn't as easy as it looks.  Anyone can make a basic saddle stitch.  That's easy.  When you start talking about straight lines, smooth curves and consistent stitches, well, now you're talking about something much harder to achieve.

There's no way I would attempt a watch strap right now.  Maybe never.  Things need to be pretty much dead on perfect at that scale for them to look right.  I'm nowhere near that good and know it.

[Sledzep01]

To me Handmade will never be the same for everyone. 

How about if only 1 person does all steps.Thats handmade to me. Clicker? sewing machine? no matter all the skill for whatever "Tool" was used all came from one person. Let them sign it or something would make it even better even if 50 people are doing it at the same time.

Machine stitched is never hand stitched, but can still be handmade.

I think for leather goods, the hand stitched is what matters most, not the cutting of the leather. people know what hands and sewing machines are even if they do not know their worth. how many even know what a clicker press is?

Sled

[Sledzep01]

22 hours ago, nstarleather said:

That basically limits the size of a shop to one-man operations.  You'll find very few operations with employees that would keep one person holding the same product from start to finish...especially when you think about the logistics of it:

 

With something like that it'd be easy to imagine, bottle-necks at each machine as one person had to wait for the next to finish.   

 

Most of the time once a shop has employees, people begin to specialize: cutting, sewing, finishing, etc...unless you're talking about some sort of shared work space for multiple different artisans, you won't find that type of setup except one-man operations.

If there are No machines then no bottlenecks and truly hand made.

But I agree with you it would limit the operation. if you had 2 or more people with the same skills there why would they have to work for the other guy... unless you can find craftsmen that want to stitch but not market...

 

Sled

 

 

[robs456]

On 2/19/2018 at 2:34 PM, Sledzep01 said:

If there are No machines then no bottlenecks and truly hand made.

But I agree with you it would limit the operation. if you had 2 or more people with the same skills there why would they have to work for the other guy... unless you can find craftsmen that want to stitch but not market...

You're both right, but it's very rare. Is it done by other companies than Hermès?
Here's a snippet from an article I found about their bag makers:
Craftsmanship is important to Hermes. It employs more than 2,500 leather artisans - Mr Dumas calls them "the backbone" - in 14 ateliers across France.
At the Parisian suburb of Pantin where the leather atelier is located, more than 340 artisans continue to handcraft leather goods the same way it has been done for more than a century. For example, it still takes one artisan about 15 hours to make a bag employing a classic saddle stitch that has been in use since the 19th century.
After the leather is cut, each worker is responsible for his bag, seeing it to finish.
Upon completion, the inside strap is stamped with the number of the workshop, the year it is finished and the craftsman's serial number. If the bag is damaged in use, a customer can send it to the same craftsman for repair.
"We train about 250 new craftsmen a year. It takes about two years to train a craftsman with each one supervised by an existing craftsman. This puts a limit on production capacity," says Mr Dumas.

 

Link: http://www.straitstimes.com/lifestyle/fashion/hermes-commitment-to-craftsmanship-keeps-business-growing

Then again, they're pretty expensive AND keep a waiting list.

[robs456]

Just now, nstarleather said:

but it still looks like "cutter" is a separate job.

Yes, like in the olden times only the most experienced get to choose the leather. From the few videos I've seen they sometimes even have two guys, one to select the leather and one to cut, but it's still pretty 'good' to have a single guy do all the different steps after that. And yes, they use a clicker press so it's not 100% handmade...