Florine

10 not-so-obvious leathercaft Christmas gifts to add to your Christmas wishlist

29 November 2018

It’s almost December and Santa is getting nervous since you didn’t hand-in your wishlist yet. In lots of posts I talk about Christmas gifts you can make or give but what about you? What’s on your Christmas wishlist this year? Do you lack some inspiration? I’ve listed 10 not-so-obvious leathercraft gifts for all budgets. They are items you might need but never buy for yourself or forgot about.

1. Bone folder

The first item on the list is perfect as a little gift for in your stocking or under the tree. With this item you can make sharp creases, folds and wiggle some room in little corners of for example a wallet.

2. (new) John James needles

You can never have enough leather craft needles. Even though I made myself a leather pin cushion I still manage to lose some or after a while break or bent them… So a few new needles could be the perfect Christmas gift!

3. Old ironing-iron

If your Santa is a bit more old fashion and loves an almost vintage gift, an old ironing-iron as a weight to not move your leather while cutting or drawing on it would be perfect. The only minor detail is that he should probably knock on the door of grandma or search in a second-hand store!

4. Cobblers hammer

To stay in the flow of old fashion tools, have you ever used a cobbler’s hammer? No, well you might want to add this one to the list. It is perfect for tapping your stitches and some folds into shape. Luckily there are also new versions of this hammer available so no endless searching for that vintage piece.

5. Circle ruler

If you make your own patterns, or if you want another corner for example on your project, the circle ruler is your go-to-tool. It consists of all different shapes of outer and inner circles to choose from. I actually am putting this one on my Christmas wishlist!

6. Personalized hot- or rubberstamp (if Santa has the vector file of your logo ??)

It might be a little late to get this gift from your Christmas wishlist… but maybe Santa can arrange a thing or two to get it to you as soon as possible! You can go for your own hot stamp to burn your logo into your leather projects or for a rubber stamp do finish all your packaging with a personal touch.

7. Edge paint roller

If you like to use edge paint, you might want to go for this little gift. It is available from cheap to expensive and might help with getting those perfect edges! No more messing around with old awls or skewers.

8. Strap cutter

You could have seen the strap cutter in action in my latest DIY project! If you want to start this project yourself, don’t forget to add the strap cutter to your list! It makes your life so much easier once you get the hang of it.

9. Japanese glass slicker / burnisher

This is a tool, I’ve seen online but never in real life… I am very curious what it does and how it works. So definitely worth mentioning it on this list! Maybe some fellow leather lovers can explain this to me?

10. Granite skiving slab

Are you ready for a big and heavy gift? This could certainly be the one. It should be a polished one if Santa is ready this … since it will help you during the skiving of your leather as long as you do this by hand.

Do you have some other gifts we might like as well, don’t hesitate to leave a comment behind! My Christmas wishlist is finished and I’m looking forward to yours.

DIY – Yoga mat straps or plaid straps

27 November 2018

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are in the past… and yet you didn’t find the perfect Christmas gifts. Luckily, I’ve got an amazing DIY for everyone; for whoever loves yoga to everyone who loves picknicks or high teas in the park. And the best thing is… it is easy to make! It will definitely be ready in time even for all the holiday stress starts… Let’s make some yoga mat straps or plaid straps!!

What do you need:

A piece of leather to cut your straps from (or you could buy pre-cut straps)
A strap cutter or Stanley knife and ruler.
Mallet
For sewing:
- Thread Two needlesPricking ironWing divider
For using rivets:
- 4 rivets + rivet setting tool
2x Sam Brown or mushroom head screw rivets
Hole punches ( I used 6mm, 2.5 mm for the keyholes and 3 mm for the rivet)

Step 1 – cutting straps

I know, I usually only show you the pre-cut pieces in the DIY but this time I wanted to show you how I do this. To cut straps I use a strap cutter which cuts straps with a certain width, according to your settings, on a straight edge. If this edge is not straight, your strap won’t be either. So make sure you’ve cut this with a long ruler for example. I’ve cut a strap of 110 cm for over your shoulder and 2 straps of 55 cm around the plaid or yoga mat. If your yoga mat is bigger the straps should ofcourse be longer.

Step 2 – One side of the round straps

The straps that go around your plaid or yoga mat need to be locked to the other side in a certain manner. I’ve chosen for the Sam brown mushroom had rivets in a keylock hole but you could also go for a small buckle. To attach the Sam Brown you first punch a small hole in the strap where the screw-thread-part fits snugly. After that, it is just simple, screw on the top and you’re done with this step. If you want to be really sure it doesn’t go anywhere. You could add a drop of glue in between.

Step 3 – The other side of the round strap

On the other side of the strap, I wanted to make a key-lock hole. So there for you can make a big and a small hole and connect the two. This shape will lock the mushroom head rivet in the smaller part while it also has the room to fit through the bigger hole. The only thing you have to pay attention to is the direction of the force. I want to lock the mushroom head rivet towards the end of the strap so my smaller hole has to be on the right of the bigger one, as shown in the image above.

Next, you can connect the two holes with a Stanley knife and a ruler. Find the outer edge of the smallest hole and cut straight to the bigger hole. The final result should look something like the image above. Repeat step 2 and 3 for the other smaller strap.

Step 4 – The shoulder strap

The two smaller straps, which keep the plaid or yoga mat into place, are connected by the shoulder strap. There are two options to make this shoulder strap. By either sew the loop or attach it by rivets, around the smaller straps. In this DIY I show you how I’ve done it by rivets.

Measure the length of the loop around the smaller straps and punch one or two holes through both sides. A rivet consists of two parts; one with a hole and one with a stalk. Put the stalk through the holes and use a rivet setter or spindle machine to set the rivet, as shown in the image below. Repeat this this on the other side aswell.

Step 5 – Instal the straps around!

The last and final step is to put it to use and strap the straps around your yoga mat or plaid. And you are good to go! Wasn’t that easy? It would also be an amazing Christmas gift so maybe you should make a few extra! Below some more pictures of the final result.

Recycle your old bag to brand new one

22 November 2018

As you might have picked up by now is that I don’t really like fast fashion bags… They are stylish and fashionable for sure, but the price-quality ratio is often horrible. Therefore I’ve got a few solutions for you; 1. Make your own!! 2. Get some vintage 100% leather bags. 3. Or maybe even better, recycle old ones. And the latter is the topic of today’s blog post!

Start over

The first option of recycling a bag is to use it purely for the leather, fabric and maybe you can reuse some of the zippers. You can cut around any scratches, pen marks or in the worst case some holes. Often a new hide is more expensive than using an old bag so this would actually not be a bad idea for beginners in leather craft! The only limitation is the size of the piece you can reuse… It is definitely smaller than the one this bag is made off. So probably you can think of a small clutch, a watch strap or a simple wallet.

Repair and retouch

If you find a bag all dirty, worn and a bit broken… Look again! Can it be repaired, cleaned and retouched? Often these bags are thrown away but are a real potential if you are looking for a bag to recycle. Start off by cleaning the bag, give it some moisturizer and do a thorough inspection which stitching needs a redo. Once the structural work is done, don’t forget the finishes. Add some edge paint where it used to be or burnish the edges with some beeswax. Hammer some shape in it again and it probably will look just as new!

Upcycle

The last option of recycling a bag is actually upcycling. For example, if you’ve got a clutch you can add some straps, a new closure, or turn it into a belt-bag! Give it some feet, maybe another color edge paint and you’ve got yourself a completely new bag!

When you recycle your bag could keep your bag in the loop over and over again until it really falls apart. Or if you don’t have any money left for a new bag this Christmas, take a look in your closet and upcycle it! There is always a way to turn something old fashion into new fashion. All you have to do is follow one of these three methods. Good luck ladies!

Kisslock bag 2.0

20 November 2018

As you could have read in my previous post about scaling your product up or down is the kisslock 2.0 bag, one of my favorites! Apparently, I was not the only one, since my new customer fell in love with the small DIY kisslock bag, but did not know how to make it herself and how to make it bigger. Of course, I love to make another beauty and made it to her order.

Shoulder strap?

Some slight changes had to be made since she didn’t want to use it as a make-up pouch or a tiny clutch. Ideally, it would have a strap of a certain width and a certain length. As you can imagine, if you can make the bag… a strap is no problem. The only thing you should think about is how to reinforce the strap. Why? Well, due to the weight of the bag, the usage and the wear of the leather it might become really thin and long as some sort of old chewing gum. That’s just what leather does, so some reinforcement makes sure this doesn’t happen.

You can reinforce it with some polyester reinforcement tape or since I did not have it, I choose for stitching it with waxed tiger thread. And just to be sure, I did it double. That means… lot’s and lot’s of stitches but with a good series on Netflix you’re done before you know it!

A bit bigger

She wanted to use it as a small daytime and nighttime bag where she could put her phone, and long wallet in. This would not fit in the tiny DIY kisslock bag so I had to scale it up a few notches. Eventually, I chose a 20 cm bag frame and the scaled up pattern according to the frame.

Scaling up a bag is apparently not that difficult. You know how to ensemble it, in what order, and what to do and not to do. That makes being able to make your own pattern a great skill. Since a single pattern might result in many many different sizes of bags, such as the kisslock bag 2.0!

New bag frame

The only difference really was the better quality of the leather and the new shape of the kisslock (which is now not a kisslock anymore but a real stylish click lock 😉 ). The previous smaller one I had to clamp the leather in between. I even glued it together to be sure. This one had a little upgrade and is also attached with reinforcement screws! Make it not only stronger but also makes it look very professional.

For now, I just have to finish the straps of the kisslock bag 2.0 and it can be sent to the new owner… so hard to say goodbye to this beauty!

Scale up or Scale down?

15 November 2018

Today my fellow Leathercraft lovers I want to talk to you about patterns since you might have seen on Instagram that I’ve started a new project. You can recognize the final product since it is a previous project scaled-up. But how do you do that… Scale something up or down?

Making you own patterns

When you’ve just started leathercraft, using patterns from books or the internet is totally fine. Although when you are ready for the next step you might think of learning to make your own patterns. Why?

Well, for me it all starts with an image in my head what the bag should look like. Finding that exact same pattern is not only nearly impossible but also, when you make it yourself, it will learn you so many things. Besides the whole reason you started leathercraft might have been because there are no bags matching with your needs and wishes.

It will learn you how different proportions do or don’t work. It will make you think of the order of construction. But most importantly it will give you the freedom in your design, shapes, and sizes.

Smaller or larger scale

Talking about sizes, sometimes you’ve made a pattern before which would also look great a bit bigger or a bit smaller. But how do you scale your pattern up or down? Well, it depends on how you’ve made your prior pattern.

In a post a while back I’ve explained how you can digitalize your patterns with Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop. If you’ve saved your document as a vector file it does not have a unit. So whether you want it be in millimeters or in kilometers is totally up to you. The only limitation would be your printer or your paper size.

The other option is to describe how you’ve made the pattern without any units attached to it. So if you describe your pattern with for example a square with a 45 degrees angle, no matter what size it is, you can scale it up or down!

Alright, if you’ve made it this far reading this post, I might as well give a small hint on my newest project… what do you think of a big bag-sibling of this lovely one?

As you can imagine is each bag frame different so I’ve applied the latter pattern option. I was so glad I’ve actually written that DIY since I had forgotten how I’ve made it before. But thanks to the DIY archive for my blog I could make the new pattern in no time ;)! Personally, this has been one of my favorite DIYs, so I’m looking forward continuing with this project!!