I took my daughter to the Seattle Mini Maker Faire, where we saw a booth by a local leatheworker. We got to talking and she offers classes. I told her that sometimes makers from my work get together to learn new schools and one thing led to another and some coworkers and I went and took a class from her.

I’d been looking to get into leatherworking, but there’s a bit of a cost to entry and there’s always the uncertainty about whether it’s something that one will actually continue to be interested in. While the instructor’s style was more rustic and less precise than is my preference, it was very helpful in giving me some context about how to work with leather, what was attainable, and whether I’d continue to be interested in it.

In particular:

  • sewing - we were instructed to make holes for sewing before connecting two pieces of leather; this led to the holes not lining up perfectly
  • glueing - the sides were sewn together rather than glued and then sewed
  • sizing - all the pieces for a project were cut from templates and then assembled, rather than glued, trimmed, and then sewed; that approach ensures that two or more joined pieces’ edges line up perfectly.

All this said, I really like her work, and her style. I just mean that it’s not my style. The week after taking the class, I went and bought supplies. I was clearly hooked.

This is the moleskine cover that I made in the class, for my sister-in-law.