Leathersmith Designs Inc. is a leather supplier for those doing leathercraft. Some
of the leathercraft supplies we stock are leather lace for wallets, waxed
thread, awls, punches and leather needles. We also sell
other leather craft supplies such as solid brass
belt buckles, leather craft hardware, metal steel strap buckles, leather craft tools,
nylon coil zippers and leather dressings.
How To Sew Leather: Hand sewing wallets, belt pouches,
briefcases or knife cases is easy with the correct tools. First
you have to mark how far from the edge of the leather you are going to
sew. There are several ways of doing this. You could just
use a compass from school for running a light line along the edge of the
leather. You could also lightly run a scratch awl guided with a
ruler to mark a line. However an adjustable creaser will allow you to mark how
far the line is to be from edge and run a line along the edge that will
be easy to see. If you want the stitching to run in a groove, it
will line up straighter and allow the thread to last longer since it
will lay below the surface to protect it from friction. The tools
used for making grooves are called an adjustable groover (used for most
leather craft projects) or a saddle maker's groover (used on heavy
harness and thick saddle leather). The bar that makes the groove
has a small set screw that adjusts how far from the edge you want your
groove. This tool can also be used for making a decorative line
along the edge of a project even if it is not sewn. The adjustable
groover works great with tooling leather but not well with soft
leathers.
Next you have to mark how far the stitches are
apart from each other. Just run the overstitcher along the line
and the pricks in the wheel will leave dots for where the stitch holes
will go. The overstitcher comes in 3 sizes. The higher the
number, the more stitches per inch. Size six is a good size to use
on your leather craft projects. You now know where to punch the
stitch holes with the awl (4 in 1 awl set).
Use the awl to
punch slits in the leather. Push the awl straight into the
leather. If you have a piece of thick cork (1 " or
thicker) you could place the leather on the cork and push the
leather through the leather into the cork backing. Without cork
you have two other options. You could lift the leather slightly
off the table and push the awl through the leather being careful not to
stab your fingers. You could also clamp the leather in a lacing
stitching pony and push the awl horizontally through the leather.
With the pony, you sit on the base and the clamp comes up between your
legs. It also helps if you put a piece of scrap leather inside the
clamp so the wood will not mark the leather. When pushing the awl
through the leather, the alignment of
slits should be at 45 degrees to the edge of the leather ( ////////)
as opposed to parallel to the edge (- - - - - -). If the
slits are parallel to the edge, it could tear since it would act like a
perforation in paper.
If you don't want to
use an awl to punch the holes, you could use the diamond hole punch
which punches angled slits. Place the leather on a cutting
board or protecto board. Make sure it is on a solid surface
that has no bounce. Hit the diamond hole punch with a rawhide
or poly head mallet. A metal hammer will tend to mushroom the
top of the tool over time. This tool would be easier to use than
the awl as you can punch four slits at a time. For tight curves
you can use the single diamond hole punch.
If you are making a hunting knife case and have
a top layer of leather, bottom layer of leather and a middle layer
(around blade edge so it won't cut thread), you would find it too thick
to punch through all three layers at once. You could do them
individually but that is a lot of work. Although this other method
I am about to describe might not be proper leather making etiquette, it
works. Before we had industrial sewing machines, we used to glue
the layers together and do the marking as previously described.
However, to get through all three layers we used a hand drill with a
drill bit that was just a little bigger than the needle. If you
have a drill press, it would work better than a hand drill because all
the holes would be perfectly perpendicular to the leather.
Now that all the holes are punched you are
ready to sew. Put a harness needle at each end of your
thread and pull the thread halfway through the leather. Next put
the needle through the next hole and pull the thread though all the
way. Take the other needle and put it through the same hole from
the opposite side and pull both threads tight. Continue this
method to the end of the slits. At the end of the slits do the
same procedure back about 6 slits and you can cut the thread without tying
knots as it will not come undone. You can use the number 0 harness
needle if you are using the waxed thread from the awl reel or the bigger
number 000 needle if you are using the 25 yard waxed thread which is
slightly heavier. If the thread is frayed a bit when you try to
put it through the eye of the needle, just rub some beeswax over the end
to hold it together.
To keep the stitch looking as neat as possible, keep
putting the needle through always on top or always on the bottom of the
other thread as opposed to sometimes on top of the slit and sometimes on
the bottom of the slit. If you find it hard to push the needle
though, you can push it part way though while wearing a sewing
palm or pull it through with needle nose pliers.
If you don't want to use harness needles to
sew, you could use the lockstitch sewing awl. The awl needles for
the lockstitch sewing awl are not strong enough to push through heavy
leather without punching slits first as discussed earlier. If it
is a very thin leather, you could get by without punching the holes
first when using the lockstitch sewing awl. Personally I find it
easier to sew with the harness needles but a lot a people like the
lockstitch sewing awl for doing general leather repairs.
How To Lace Leather:
First mark how far from the edge the lace holes
will be by pushing the adjustable creaser along the edge of the
leather. You could also run the scratch all along a ruler to mark
a line in the leather.
Next you will need to punch slits in the
leather for the lace. Put the leather on a cutting
board or protecto board so that the edge of the chisels will have
something to go into that will not damage the end of the tool. It
works best on a solid surface that has no bounce. Line up the 1
prong, 4 prong or 8 prong chisel on the line and hit it with a rawhide
or poly head mallet. On sharp curves you would have to use the
single prong chisel and on straight runs use the 8 prong chisel or 4
prong chisel to save time.
If you do not want to punch slits for the
lace you could use the 4-in-1 punch to punch round holes. For
going around curves you could punch individual round holes with the mini
punch.
There are two common needles used for holding
the Tejas Superior Lace which are the loc eye (Hook-N-Eye) needle and
the
2 Prong Lacing Needles. Thin the lace thickness with a utility
knife or a French edge skiving tool in order to fit it between the
spring of the 2 prong lacing needle. You can squeeze it tight with
some needle nose pliers being careful not to bend the prongs. I
personally prefer using the hook-n-eye needle because I find the lace is
less apt to pull free from the needle when you are lacing. With
the hook-n-eye needle, you need to narrow the width of the leather so it
can fit through the eye of the needle. You should also thin the
lace so it can fit between the needle spring. Then squeeze the
spring tight with needle nose pliers being careful not to bend the hook
(prong).
Projects such as wallets require a lot of lace
if you are doing a fancy lace edge. Because you do not want to
pull yards and yards of lace through every slot, you might want to lace
the wallet with 3 or 4 lengths of lace that you join together when you
are almost at the end of the lace. To do this, you need to splice
the each end for about one inch to a feathered end. You could use
a utility knife or craftool French
edge skiving tool to splice the lace. Put a quality
contact cement on each piece. When the contact cement is almost
dry to the touch, squeeze them together and then tap them with a hammer on
a mini anvil. You have to be careful when you
pull the jointed pieces through the hole / slit to make sure you do not
tear the joint apart.
Up to this point I have been discussing lacing
with the Tejas superior lace which is commonly used lace when lacing a
wallet or other similar leather craft projects. If you want to
lace using a heavy lace like a leather shoe lace for bigger projects
like briefcases or purses, you will have to punch larger round holes
with the mini punch. As mentioned before, put the leather on a
protecto board or cutting board to make the cutting edge of the hole
punch last longer. Sometimes we just put a piece of scrap leather
under the leather project when using round hole punch to protect the
cutting edge if the cutting board isn't handy. An easy way to pull
this heavy lace through the holes is to use a jumbo perma lok
needle. Cut the lace narrower and to a pointat one end with your
utility knife. Take this pointed end of the lace and twist it into
the end of the perma lok needle. The hole in the end of this
needle is threaded to grip the leather lace.
Leathersmith
Designs Inc.
88 Woodlawn Road, Dartmouth, NS, B2W 2S5, Canada
Phone 902-434-9721 Fax 902-404-3890
E-Mail Us Order Toll Free: 1-800-845-1829
(Canada & United States) Mon - Fri. 9am - 5pm Atlantic
Standard Time
