And the leather is back! After my no-sew square envelope pouch, I wanted to try practicing hand stitching on leather and also edge burnishing techniques. This brought me to my favorite place in Hong Kong: Sham Shui Po of course! After learning a few tricks from the passionate owner of Index shop (address below), I bought a few supplies and had a tremendous time creating this nice piece of leather. I hope you will too!
Supplies needed:
- A small piece of thick black leather
- A very small piece of gold leather (thin)
- 2 leather needles
- 1 seat awl
- 1 edge shave
- 1 handwheel pricking frame
- 1 gold thread
- Leather glue
- Binder clips
- Cutter
- Cutting mat
- Rag
- Gum tragacanth ( to burnish the edges)
- This free pattern for my leather card case
Supplies shops address:
For leather tools:
Index
Shop 11, G/F,
Yau Nam mansion,
97 Nam Cheong Street
Sham Shui Po
A small shop with a friendly owner speaking English. He took time to explain me how to use the tools and techniques to burnish the edges. Totally worth a stop!
For metallic threads:
C&S Industrial Company
Shop 6, G/F,
Yau Nam mansion,
97 Nam Cheong Street
Sham Shui Po
A small shop in Sham Shui Po with a large selection of colors and metallic threads at a small price.
DIY steps
1. Prepare your leather pieces
Use a cutter and cutting mat to cut the leather pieces as per the free pattern provided here.
2. Special cut
On the inside left part, follow the pattern to create 2 punch holes of 3 mm diameter and a make a diagonal cut between the two holes.
3. Gluing
Start by gluing the biggest parts: apply 0.5cm glue in the outer edges only – the inner side shall not be glued to be able to fit the cards!
The two triangles can then be completely glued. Pay special attention to glue correctly the corners.
Use binder clips to maintain everything in place during the drying.
4. Edges trimming & smoothing
After cutting, you will notice the edges are a bit rough. To give them a nicer look, follow these few steps:
– use fine grain sanding paper to start the smoothing
– use the edge shave to trim the corners all around
– apply some gum tragacanth with the finger. A small quantity is sufficient. Rub the edge with a rag until it is fully absorbed by the leather. This product will burnish the edges to give a more finished look to your project.
5. Sewing
The glue is sufficient to maintain the parts together. But for a durable object, it is recommended to sew everything together.
To do so, I have chosen a gold metallic thread to match the gold leather.
The first thing to do is to mark the holes around the edges.
To do so, you can use the hand wheel.
Then use the seat awl to enlarge the holes.
Prepare your wire: it should be 2.5 times longer than the seam to be done.
Fix one needle at each end of the thread.
Make sure to thread the needle into the wire to make a knot.
Then, thread one needle in the first hole and make sure you center it.
Enlarge the second hole with the seat awl. Thread the first needle in the next hole and the second needle from the other side in the same hole. Repeat these steps until you reach the last hole.
To finish, go backwards and do 3 stitches more. Cut the remaining thread and push the ends inside the hole to hide it.
You are done!
Happy crafting everyone.
If you like leather projects, have a look at my chevron leather pouch DIY.
And if sewing is not your cup of tea, I have also prepared a cute no-sew square envelope pouch DIY with free printable pattern!
Please let me know if you enjoyed this DIY and I would love seeing your creations so do not hesitate to share below in the comments section.