Saturday, June 9, 2012

leather gorget part 2



                                                                               
We are further along in the process of making this leather gorget but still not finished.

There are so many decisions to be made and each decision often causes more questions to be asked and processes to be figured out.

In this case, I had started out thinking that we would mount the leather on the felt base. The pattern I made was for the felt and I had to calculate by trial and error how much bigger to make the leather that would cover the felt since the circumference is greater. The pieces were joined edge to edge to reduce bulk and decorative strips of the embossed leather were stitched on top of the seams. The wide strips with the acorn nuts were backed onto boot leather for strength, which made them a certain thickness, so that meant I needed a longer screw to go through the thicker leather and still have enough space left for the leather thonging to go under the acorn nut. I had to order longer brass screws which led to a 10 day wait due to  an ordering fiasco of failed faxing, minimum order fulfillment and shipping errors.

By that time, I realized that trying the bind the top edge over the felt was making it all too thick, so I ditched the felt, re cut the inside structure out of boot weight leather, and reconfigured the outer layer of existing work to fit. I also then changed the opening to the centre back since it is now a quick change item and I don't have to worry about how to make the front opening (which is more visible) functional.

We also wanted the decoration strips to not be caught in the binding at the top and bottom, but have the screws go through the strips and the top layer of leather to hold them together, but not through the lining leather.

Arggghh!!
Sometimes it is so frustrating when your finished product is your prototype.

Everything is so plain to see in retrospect, don't you think? 
The second and third versions will be much better I'm sure. In fact, I started a gorget for another character using boot liner leather. This I seamed for rigidity, as the leather that is on the outside is a bit softer than it should be. It also has similar decorative strips with acorn nuts but the strips are made of belting leather, which is almost  1/4" thick!! So even if things are the same (gorget) the materials we are given for each specific item change the game in terms of construction methods.


4 comments:

  1. I really love the style and design of your gorget. Would you happen to have pictures of your pattern or any advice other than what's in your post on how to go about making this? I was going to try to attempt it with some vinyl first before I went into leather.

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  2. I am afraid those patterns are in storage! BTW, i am not the designer! The designs are given to me and I make the patterns based on what I see.
    I can't really help with much more because it is something you just have to do, try things out because what you do is likely to be different than what I would do anyway.
    Have fun doing them!

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  3. Do you have any pictures of the completed gorget? Or does it look pretty much like the one in the picture. I absolutely love your work. I pinned it on Pinterest. :-)
    Now I need to make a proper board for it since I just threw it into a random board where I compile stuff I like without worrying about the category.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks. It pretty much looks like this, just with the lacing looped around the bolts.

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