AY Honors/Leather Craft/Answer Key

This article describes leather carving in detail. For information about leather craft in detail, please see Leather crafting

Leather carving is the process of giving a three-dimensional appearance to leather by a process of cutting and stamping the surface.

Raw Materials

The only type of leather suitable for carving is vegetable tanned, top grain leather. This is because the vegetable tanning process allows the leather to absorb water, which is used to soften the leather before the carving process, and the grain of the leather is necessary to allow the leather to hold the shape after the carving process is complete. Other leathers lack these two essential qualities.

Tools

Leather carving is accomplished using three main tools:

• Swivel Knife - used to make the bold cuts that define the pattern or image being carved
• Rawhide Mallet - used to drive the stamps used to mat down the background and create shading and patterns
• Stamp Set - A set of stamping tools used to shape and color the leather to create the final image. Usually contains at minimum a beveler, pear shader, seeder, and background tool, but sets often contain other tools and sometimes several variations on the same tool.

Preparation

Before carving can commence, the leather must be prepared to accept the tooling by 'casing' it. This is done by applying water to the grain side of the leather with a sponge. After a short time, the surface of the leather will darken and feel cool to the touch. At this point, the leather is ready for carving. For some large projects, it may be necessary to re-case the leather as it dries during the carving session.

Swivel Knife Cuts

When the leather has been properly cased, the swivel knife is used to make the bold cuts that form the backbone of the carved image. These cuts are made to a depth of up to approximately half the thickness of the leather being used, depending on the effect desired by the leather worker. Care must be taken during this step to keep the swivel knife vertical at all times, as any tilt is detrimental to the ability of the leather to be properly stamped later in the carving process.

Beveling the Cuts

After the initial cuts are made with the swivel knife, the Beveler is used to compress one side of the cut. This creates the impression of depth by pressing down the background parts of the image relative to the foreground. The Beveler is used by holding it vertically, with the foot of the tool in contact with the leather, and striking it lightly with the rawhide mallet. The tool is then moved forward along the cut about half its width, and struck again with the mallet. This process is completed until the entire length of the cut has been appropriately beveled.