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I dabble in leather work in my spare time. A friend of mine wanted me to make a couple of holsters for his wife and mother, so.....







What a militant family that is. It was fun to do a leather project. It's been a while.

A 1911 with a 4 inch barrel... that makes me sad.

This is how I roll...


very nice leather work by the way (you should make an inside the waist hold, they make it easier to hide your piece)


...actually, I've been staring at that picture and it's starting to look more and more like a full sized 5 inch barrel

Rock on. My personal carry weapon is a SIG 229, however I have a special place in my heart for my Springfield 1911 in Stainless. I take her boar hunting!

ITW holsters are nice but more difficult to make (for me at least). I have one that I use all the time for my SIG. It works great.

Do you do the full cuirre broille?

David

Very cool Jesse. My only leather project was making a wallet out of an old pair of bikers boots. I've used it for years and probably always will. It looks like those will last quite a while too. You did a nice job. Looks like good thick leather too.

Brian.

DMI wrote:Do you do the full cuirre broille?

David

I guess I have no clue what that means.....

The leather is what we call 'vegetable tanned' that means it is suitable for tooling and stamping impressions.

I like these, but the finish turned out pretty bad. Tandy leather is moving away from stocking the Fiebings that we know and love so well with some crap called eco-flow. It's supposed to be better for the environment, but this stuff sucks. Unfortunately all my Fiebing's was with my pipe making supplies so I had no other dye

Cuirre Broille litraly means 'boiled leather' and is the old fashioned way of moulding leather for water bottles, armour etc. You use veg or oak tanned leather which you soak in hot or boiling water until it goes all soft and floppy, it is then moulded and placed in an oven to speed dry. You end up with really hard leather.

When I did Gladiator I had to make 30 sets of Roman armour and had fibre glass moulds made, most of the extras ended up with fibreglass armour or really nasty 'Hollywood' leather stuff.

One of the oldest pieces of leather work known is a 3000 year old moulded beaker in Northampton Museum.

David.

Cool stuff, David. Thanks for the info. Did you really work with the Gladiator movie? That's one of my favorites.

I wetted the leather with warm water and then molded it around the weapon with a modeling tool, essentially just a rounded dowel. I let these air dry. I've experimented hardening leather by giving it a bath in beeswax before, placing it in the oven to absorb. It worked relatively well.

Everything I know about leather I taught myself. It was my primary hobby before pipes came along.

Now that I think about it, I should find a leather crafting forum.

One day I hope to use leather working skills in conjunction with pipe making. I have a stingray pelt that I want to make a pipe pouch out of. Anyway, cool stuff.

Braveheart, The Bruce, Rob Roy, The Four Feathers, Gladiator, some Dragon thingy in Germany, The Globe Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, The BBC, Channel 4, several museums for handling collections. My speciality was 15-17th century, I never really got the hang of shoes though.

It payed the rent for several years.

David.

DMI wrote:Braveheart, The Bruce, Rob Roy, The Four Feathers, Gladiator, some Dragon thingy in Germany, The Globe Theatre, Royal Shakespeare Company, The BBC, Channel 4, several museums for handling collections. My speciality was 15-17th century, I never really got the hang of shoes though.

It payed the rent for several years.

David.

You should post some pics of your work for the movies. I mean, I know I can watch the movie and see your work, but I'd love to see some photos if you have any!

Brian.

I still have a few bits and pieces kicking about so I may do.

Please do! Love armor and swords and stuff.

But then, who doesn't?