"Carving" on Western Style Holsters

[PAMuzzle]

If making a "period correct" or wishing it comes out that way, how deep should carving go into the leather? 

Sheridan carving is fairly deep to my understanding and a lot of pull ups on leaves and petals.  Did western holsters have that intricate work or was it less deep and closer to just scratching the surface.  Similar to a cowboy scratching in a design in the bunk house or on the trail?

[Dwight]

Cannot say about holsters, . . . 

But I've got a "Jumbo" saddle I bought out of a pawn shop in Denver,  . . . looks like some old cowboy bought or made some stamps, . . . and attempted to "dress up" his saddle, and I really like the thing. 

None of the stampings are very deep at all, . . . 

Bought it as a decoration for my leather shop, . . . but will be putting it back out to pasture later this summer, . . . a friend in Az wants it, . . . so it's going back on the trail.

I just wish I could get it to talk to me for a couple hours before it leaves, . . . just know it could tell some stories I'd love to hear.

May God bless,

Dwight

Edited March 3, 2018 by Dwight

[DpMaquilon]

10 hours ago, Dwight said:

Cannot say about holsters, . . . 

But I've got a "Jumbo" saddle I bought out of a pawn shop in Denver,  . . . looks like some old cowboy bought or made some stamps, . . . and attempted to "dress up" his saddle, and I really like the thing. 

None of the stampings are very deep at all, . . . 

Bought it as a decoration for my leather shop, . . . but will be putting it back out to pasture later this summer, . . . a friend in Az wants it, . . . so it's going back on the trail.

I just wish I could get it to talk to me for a couple hours before it leaves, . . . just know it could tell some stories I'd love to hear.

May God bless,

Dwight

How about a picture?

[Dwight]

1 hour ago, DpMaquilon said:

How about a picture?

I can do that.............

May God bless,

Dwight

[Stetson912]

I'm not real sure, but I'm thinking that tools were far less advanced during that period. Therefore the tooling would be far less detailed than what we can achieve today. I'm not a carver per say and certainly no saddle maker, but I believe the stohlman/Porter style would have been closer to what was used for ornamentation. I would think depth of tooling would have been similar, but again, just speculation.

[kiwican]

I watched an interview with stolhman it showed some of the tools he used to tool leather with. All hand made and not many of them either. If that was true he did amazing work with practically nothing. May have been the same "back in the cowboy day"

[PAMuzzle]

Thanks to all.  Think I will stick to less deep for more realistic Western period style.  Found this on another thread From Steve 75 - 

 

Edited March 4, 2018 by PAMuzzle

[Mechanic]

I attended a workshop on saddle carving with Troy West and Pedro Pedrini recently.  They spent a day on layout, theory and what is pleasing to the eye.

It was absolutely astounding to watch them take a 4"x9" piece of leather, sketch a pattern and tool it...in less than an hour. I stood there slack-jawed in amazement.

In all reality, they don't use a large number of tools for the basic patterns. One thing that I picked up immediately, quality tools give better results.

 

 

 

 

[Lizardo]

All the photos I have seen of originals the carving wasn't very deep, not even the Meana's but still pretty intricate and apparently not many tools used either.