Leather Working & Craft: Main Techniques and Tools

Man has always been linked to the leather: he fed and healed himself through the skin of animals, but not only, but leather material was also used to communicate through the engraving of simple drawings or the language of signs on it. With the evolution, the passing of the ages and technology, leather has become more and more a material used and worked, often unconsciously at the centre of the life of every human being, up to today reaching its maximum expression, that is the creation of luxury items and leather craft at the highest levels.

Leather working is therefore the practice by which leather is transformed into craft objects like jackets, wallets, bags or shoes, using certain techniques and tools.

The main leather working techniques are:

• Painting
• Dyeing
• Carving
• Engraving/Stamping (Tooling)
• Shaping
• Laser or hand cutting
• Perforation
• Pyrography
• Fattening

Read More: DO’S AND DON’TS OF WEARING A LEATHER JACKET

Main leather crafting and leather working tools

The main tools needed to work the leather are:

1. Leather material, the first and most important step is to choose the right leather craft material suitable for the realization of the project you have in mind, usually, vegetable-tanned leather is used, which is best suited to all the processing techniques listed above.
2. Sewing thread.
3. Working tablet.
4. Round knife, one of the main tools for working leather and leather, thanks to the many functions it can perform, in particular cutting and driving.
5. Rotary Cutter, a little versatile tool, but easy to use for cutting.
6. Edge Bevelling machines used to remove parts of the edges, rounding them.
7. Diamond Chisels, useful tools to puncture the points through the skin.
8. Creaser/Groover, a tool used to cut a small channel on the skin surface, to ensure that the seams do not stick and therefore create less friction with the skin during the use of the object.
9. Stitching Awl, to stretch and create holes for sewing, the more the blade is pushed into the skin, the wider the hole becomes.
10. Edge Burnisher, this tool is used to create smooth surfaces.
11. Stitching Needles, for sewing, the holes must not be too large, so that once the knot is tied to the thread it remains fixed.
12. Stitching Horse, a useful tool to hold the skin while it is being sewn.
13. Rubber hammer, a tool used for hammer punches and setters, in particular punches, rivets and tools.
14. Punches, for punching rivet holes, are available in different sizes.
15. Riveting Setters, a tool for attaching rivets.

Read More: 4 MYTHS ABOUT LEATHER YOU SHOULDN'T BE BELIEVING

Conclusion: 

In conclusion, to be able to carry out a project with leather, it is necessary to choose first of all what type of object you want to achieve, after this, you need to have the knowledge on leather working techniques and leather crafting tools, choose the type of leather suitable for the work that you are going to do and which tools are the most useful for the project. 

My Favourite Leather Product is Leather Jackets!

Enable GingerCannot connect to Ginger Check your internet connection
or reload the browserDisable in this text fieldEditEdit in GingerEdit in Ginger×