A classmate asked me to make her a bag like I have. This was a great opportunity to improve the little things that I didn’t like that much in my own bag. The construction of the bag is mostly the same as my own, so for pictures of that go to the other post.
Another leather and linen tote bag
A few months back I made this tote bag for my brother’s girlfriend. Now I made another one. It’s slightly different: its bottom is made out of rhubarb-tanned sheep leather, made from sheep that graze freely on the Lüneburger Heide in Germany. I liked the sound of that! I bought this stuff at Dictum (link), and it wasn’t really expensive. The only downside was the colour. In the pictures on the website the leather looks quite like normal fresh veg-tan leather – pale, no distinct colour. This stuff was yellow. So I decided to dye it. I used a dye that was labelled “light-brown”, but it resulted in this deep, dark brown colour. The process of dyeing also changed the feel of the leather: before it was quite silky and almost a bit velvety, and after it was glossy and smooth. The result was unexpected, but I quite like it in this bag. The lining is also different from the previous bag. I used a linen/cotton mixture that has a subtle pattern woven in. If you look closely at the picture below, you can see it has vertical blue, white and red lines. The fabric has a nice vintage-y feel to it.
A Recycled Leather and Waxed Linen Wallet
A friend of mine asked me to make him a wallet. Requirements: it should be able to hold coins, bills, and 8 cards or so. I made him this wallet out of recycled veg-tanned leather and waxed linen. The outside comes from an old bag that had a lot of water damage. It also supplied the leather for my shoulder bag. I love the patina the leather built up over the years (probably decades, since the bag looked distinctly seventies to me). You can really see it has some good age to it. inside consists of a thin layer of split leather and the waxed linen stitched together. The pocket for the coins runs until the middle of the wallet, where I stitched the two layers together again to stop coins from rolling over to the left side of the wallet. On the left side there is a piece of leather with three slits to put the three most frequently used cards in. The rest of the cards go behind the piece of leather. The black stitching is done by machine, the white is waxed linen thread that is hand stitched for greater strength. The inside slopes slightly to the right so it is easier to get your bills out. All corners were beveled and burnished with saddle soap and linen. I really love this method, much faster than gum tragacanth and a wood burnisher. The saddle soap I currently use also gives the leather a lovely smell.
Waxed Linen Case
A friend of mine is just starting out as a hairdresser. She had this transparent plastic case for the holster she carries her combs and scissors in (there must be an official term for that thing…). The plastic case was falling apart, so I made her this waxed linen case for her birthday. The red part is the same linen the bottom, dyed red with Dylon dye and waxed with my homemade Greenland Wax. The bottom isn’t waxed, neither is the cotton lining. The lining is stitched to the bottom so it won’t turn inside out when you pull out the holster. Most of the construction is the same as this tote bag I made, except for the lining and the zipper. The lining is top-stitched in together with the zipper. The corners of the zipper are hand-stitched to make the whole thing extra bomb-proof.
Building a hewing bench, part 2: Splitting the log, change of plans.
This post is long overdue. I’ve been postponing this one, because it’s a lot to write about. In turn, it became a lot more to write about by postponing. I’ve decided to give a short summary of this project. It’s not a success story, but I learned a lot and I’m still pretty happy with the results. But if you’re planning on splitting a big log, especially if it’s your first, you might want to read this post to see what I did wrong and how I solved the problems I ran into.
Leather and waxed linen bag
Update: I made another one of these, with new leather and red linen for the bottom.
I’ve been using a blue “pukkel” (a Dutch marines supply bag that looks a bit like a haversack, very common in the Netherlands) every day the last couple of years. It’s made out of virtually indestructible canvas, it’s simple and I think it has a certain aesthetic to it that I love. It has a couple of disadvantages: it’s a bit small, and especially a bit too narrow. It wont comfortably fit an A4 sized notepad. And even though it’s small, I always have a hard time finding my stuff in it, since it has no pockets or dividers, it’s just one big compartment.
Making Greenland Wax
Well, it’s been raining for days and in barely a week temperatures have dropped from nearly tropical to 13 celsius. I’ll have to face it, it’s autumn. Time to waterproof my stuff. I read a lot about Greenland wax and otter wax, and though: “that shouldn’t be hard to make”. Turns out, it isn’t! These waxes that are used to waterproof fabrics rarely contain more than two ingredients. I made a three ingredient recipe that smells great and is easy to make.