Joseph Dixon Edge Bevellers

I thought, that this blog would be about clothing mostly, but it has turned out to be about leatherworking tools. Please bear with me.

If you work with leather you'll definitely have come across Tandy. Tandy is a major corporation, that sells leather, tools and whatever you may need, but almost never of a good quality. They have killed off the competition and basically they control the market. You can get every tool you need to get started, but at some point when you feel, that your skills are improving, you'll start getting a bit annoyed by the inferior tools. This is basically the point, where I am now. I feel the need to exchange some of my older, starter tools with some new better tools.

There are very few good makers of leatherworking tools left - especially in Europe. Vergez Blanchard of France is one, Joseph Dixon of England is another.

I decided to go for Dixon, when I needed new edge bevellers, and I haven't been disappointed so far. An edge beveller or edge shaver is a tool, that you use to chamfer the edge of a piece a leather before you start treating the edges further.

Dixon tools are still made in England and the company has been around since 1843. The recipe seems to be the same; Good materials, steel, brass and wood. Simple.

Dixon makes two different kinds of edge shavers and they come in sizes from 1-8. I went for 2 and 3 of both kinds because they're often the ones, that you'll be reaching for the most. I wouldn't mind getting the rest of the bunch though.

This is a flat edge shaver, which is the type you see the most nowadays and it's great for smaller accessories.

This is the rounded edge shave is very similar to the flat edge shave, but as you can see, it's concave and will cut of slightly more leather and round the leather a bit more. This is used for belts mostly.

Knot Clothing & Belt Co.

Sometimes I feel tired of wearing a leather belt, and sometimes I have beer goggles - perfect match. Grosgrain, brass D-ring makes for a pretty cool and fun casual belt. I'm really starting to prepare for summer.

Made in the USA by Knot Clothing & Belt Co

Viberg Ripple Sole Oxford

I've been advocating for Superdenim before, and I'll probably be doing it again, as they are doing very, very well. At the moment they are starying a bit off the path, that they followed to begin with, which is good in a way, but I just never hope, that they stop carrying hard-to-find Japanese brands like The Real McCoy's.

I have also praised the Oxford model from Viberg before. It's beautiful, extremely well-made and very wearable.

So when I saw, that Superdenim had just released 4 new Oxfords, I got pretty excited. Each and everyone of them could easily become a wardrobe stable with me and m, however the price might just prove to be a stumbling block.

My favourite is - of course - the one with the ripple sole (by Vibram), which is quite in mode at the moment, but very few people realize, that it dates back to the 50's and was used in the US army. The Ripple Sole was also used on some nice Viberg make-ups for both Inventory and Leffot. 

Other than the sole it features some very nice details such as the brass eyelets on the rough out suede and the laces are some of the nicest ever.

I have some personal information about the Viberg Oxford, that I would really like to share, however this will happen sometime next week..

Otter Messer - Ankermesser

I'm spending some time in the Southern part of Denmark on vacation. I'm hoping to do some reading, make some drawings of some future designs and maybe finally find the right snaps fasteners, which I have been looking for since I can't remember when. Maybe that is an unrealistic wish, but one can dream. But I will surely get some much needed sleep, do some cooking and hopefully I'll also get to do some blogging. Since I'm located so close to the German border right now, I figured, that I could write a post on a German-made piece of art.

At the moment my favourite pocket knife is this little gem from the German company Otter Messer, which is based in Solingen. The company has been around since the 1887 and they are still being made in Germany.

What initially caught my interest was the beautiful brass-anchor inlay, so I'll gladly admit, that it was an aesthetic decision to begin with. I liked the nautical reference and I figured, that this would have been a knife, that my grandfather, who was a sailor, would have liked. When I received the knife, I was surprised, how sharp and generally well-made this knife is. Especially if you consider the price. I think this knife represents true value for money. You won't be getting a lot of different tools in your knife - that you'll probably never use anyways- however you'll get a very sharp knife, that will take a beating. And may I just add, that the looks will improve with use? The brass rivets and inlay will tarnish and so will the carbon steel blade.

This post wouldn't be complete without a small clip, that shows how the Ankermesser (German for Anchor Knife) is made, now would it?

Crafts - Key Wallet - Quick Proto

The weather has been horrible today. Overcast and constant showers. I was hoping to spend this day taking some pictures of a new acquisition (in natural light that is) and some other good stuff, but that couldn't be done. So instead I stayed in the basement making a proto type of a key wallet, that I have been meaning to make for my brother-in-law for too long.

I say that this is a proto because I made it very quickly and I didn't have all the right hardware for it. For instance I could have used some smaller snaps and surely also some double capped rivets. And lastly I busted my leather scissor some days ago because I managed to use it on some metal, which is a stupid thing to do. This meant I couldn't round the corners, as well as I'm normally able to do. Anyways, enough with the poor excuses for being a bad leather worker.

For the wallet I used a new, very special leather (from Horween...) with a great story, that I'll tell about some other day and all brass hardware. The inside was treated with Tragacanth and the outside was just brushed over with some Neatsfoot oil, which is also why it seems a bit stained or uneven in the colour. But please go to Flickr and see some higher resolution pics - blogger portrays pictures very poorly.

I sincerely hope that it will get some good use and I sincerely hope that the political party, that my brother-in-law is so involved in, will get a lot of votes at the election this Thursday.

Lastly I would like to thank everybody for the great response that the laundry bag got. I will definitely be making more. Tomorrow I'll be going to Copenhagen to visit friends and family, but I'll still be blogging, albeit not as much.

Sunday Finds

Today is Sunday, yesterday was Saturday and tomorrow is Monday. But let's focus on today being Sunday and a lucky one indeed.

I'm a huge collector of many things. For instance I collect stoneware, ceramics, vintage fabrics, zippers, tools, clothing and I also collect watches - automatic watches that is.

So when my girlfriend and I decided to go to a local flea market, I was really happy when I stumbled upon no less than 7 automatic vintage watches in mixed condition!

Who on earth puts a FixoFlex strap on an antique watch?

Besides the watches which I'm going to clean up, rub on some Polywatch and most likely put on some new straps (Goodbye, FixoFlex). I also found a really nice Bakelite measuring tape and two old, solid brass snaps that I can use for my leather crafts.

My girlfriend also picked up some wooden aircraft assembly kits. Which made me kinda nostalgic because I used to make - and collect - similar kits when I was a child. When I saw them I instantly felt the strong adhesives tickling in my nose.

It'll be some good fun, when we put the "Curtiss Goshawk" together.