Most of the leather used in the world comes from the U. The hides are preserved in salt until they reach the tanning factories around the world, mostly in China and Korea. Lamood LLC is a leading e-commerce accessory retailer offering hard to find accessories for men and women. WalletGear leather wallets and wallet accessories are made of superior leather with expert craftsmanship and at an affordable price.
WalletGear has the widest range of wallets available including leather credit card wallets , leather key cases , mens leather wallets , and money clips. Also if you need more room for credit cards, business cards, and photos, get a new wallet insert today!
You will have access to new and exclusive discount offers and new products before everyone else! We promise to only send you good things! Customer Login If you are already registered, please log in. Email Address:. Forgot your password?
Create your account and enjoy a new shopping experience. The grain generally has densely packed fibers that are finer; this results in a surface that is very strong, durable, and can withstand tough use. Because it undergoes no sanding, the surface can have minor imperfections. These might be from where a cow rubbed up against a fence, a small cut they might have received, or scrapes from everyday life. Full grain hides without many blemishes are the most prized, as they are least common and are the most visually appealing.
Those surface fibers are also what give it the most strength of any leather type. This makes it good for saddlery, footwear, and furniture.
The outer layer also provides some water-resistance qualities as well. Full Grain is looked upon as the highest quality leather available. This makes the leather softer and more pliable, with various dyes and finished applied to it. While this sanding makes it more visually appealing, it also removes a lot of the strength and some water-repellent qualities of full grain leather.
This we begin to see a tradeoff between leather strength, and leather look and softness. Given its softness and flexibility, top grain leather is often used in high end leather goods, including handbags, wallets, and shoes.
The process alters some of the preferred qualities of leather, so while not a top quality, it is often used for belts and similar goods. Split grain leather is a layered cut of leather from within the lower levels of the top grain area of the hide. It is usually a lower layer of the hide, above the flesh. Also, below the full grain and the best top grain cuts. Though, it still provides a useful leather material. The natural surface of split grain leather is not as dense, tight, and useful as full grain and top grain.
Thus, it is often used in finishes of leathers that are colored, embossed, and the surface altered in some significant way. This allows it to offer some of the helpful qualities of a leather material, while having a visually pleasing and often-functional surface beneficial for leather products.
Bonded leather is like the scrapple or hot dogs of leather; it is made up of leather scraps that are finely shredded and bonded together using polyurethane or latex onto a fiber mesh or sheet. For a deeper look, click here for my article about bonded leather. When raw hides are produced by meatpackers, they immediately grade them.
This grade is used to determine the quality of the raw hide, and enables accurate sales to tanneries. The tanneries will ultimately tan the hides, processing the raw material into a finished leather.
When grading raw hides, the inspectors will look for issues including holes, deep cuts, scars, large abrasions, discolorations, machine damage from the skinning machines , remaining hair, and grain inconsistencies. It is important to keep in mind, too, that many large ranch operations brand their cattle to denote ownership. Branding involves permanently burning a unique pattern usually letters or initials into the skin of the animal.
A metal brand in the form of the pattern is heated, then pressed into the animal to leave the pattern permanently burned into the hide. While common, the brand impact to the hide quality is also accounted for in the grading process. Number one hides are top grade hides. They generally have no major surface imperfections, holes, or cuts.
A number two hide is allowed to have up to four holes or cuts, as long as they are located in a generally straight line on the hide. This would allow them to be cut around later, still yielding a sizable area of usable hide.
Grain defects should also be no larger than approximately 1 ft. Number three hides generally have five or more holes or large cuts within the hide, ideally within a generally straight line. There might also be grain defects, or a series of closely-located smaller holes that comprise a surface area larger than 1 ft.
Generally, number three grade hides are only purchased by tanners when they have specifically agreed to purchase this grade of hide. Hides that do not meet the quality standards of grades number one, two, or three are deemed untannable. They are not shipped to tanners, and enter another viable channel for use of the raw animal hide materials, outside of the leather industry.
A finished leather hide has a fairly large amount of leather to choose from when deciding where to cut from the use pieces on a project. Finished leather can usually be purchased based on cut type. This can include the full hide, or specific areas within it. Based on the type of project you are working on and the performance characteristics you want in the finished piece, it can be helpful to know what the different available cuts are.
A whole leather hide encompasses the entire skinned and tanned hide from an animal. Since it includes the areas from all of the other related cuts, the leather available will range from softer areas with various stretch characteristics, to thicker, stiffer areas of the hide. The range of leather thickness and weight will vary across the entire hide.
The side cut of a leather hide is a half of an entire hide, cut lengthwise along the middle. The shoulder cut of a leather hide comes from the shoulder area of the animals. This area generally has a firm, yet malleable and flexible feel to it. Shoulder cuts work well for tooling. The double shoulder cut of a leather hide comes from the shoulder area of the animals.
It is essentially the entire shoulder area from the hide. The bend cut of a leather hide is from the area ranging from the spine towards the belly, towards the middle of the hide. This is some of the best leather available in a hide, the prime sections generally towards the hind side before the butt. It is best used for across a number of leather product applications.
The double bend cut of a leather hide is from the area ranging from the spine towards the belly, towards the middle of the hide. The butt cut of a leather hide is from the hind leg portion of the hide, running around the butt and up towards the spine.
This is the thickest and firmest area of the hide. Butt cuts make a good leather for thicker items such as heavy belts. The double butt cut of a leather hide is from the hind leg portion of the hide, running around the butt and up towards the spine, on both sides of the hide. A sign of a properly turned edge is that when you run your finger over the edge, there is no discernable lip. A properly constructed corner will have a pleated edge. In less well made wallets the corners are square, with the leather cut and folded to create the corner.
However, this weakens the leather. A luxury wallet will have a rounded edge with pleats stitched in, holding the leather in place. Finally, any luxury leather wallet should include creases to accentuate linear features on the wallet, normally just below the credit card slots and the outer borders of some of the individual leather panels. These are effected with a hot iron creating a permanent crease or linear indenation in the leather.
The features and construction techniques outlined above require very high levels of leatherwoking skill, care, craftsmanship and time. We make luxury leather wallets deserving of this title. To mimic top grain leather, a finish is added to the top surface.
Bonded leather is made up of small pieces of leather that are "bonded" together to form a single piece. The outermost and innermost layers of hide are usually separated by manufacturers.
Because of its affordability, genuine leather is the most common type of leather found in wallets. Our Easy Squeeze Coin Purse is a common genuine leather coin purse. Top grain leather wallets are made from the hide's outermost layer, which has been processed or sanded to hide serious flaws.
Since the outer layer of the hide is the most durable, top grain leathers are more durable than split grain leathers. Top grain leathers may be made to look like exotic skins like alligator or ostrich during the manufacturing process. Top grain nappa cowhide leather wallets are made from the upper part of the hide split from the dermis which products the highest quality and most supple leather goods.
Shop top grain leather card cases and wallets. View top grain leather key cases. The outermost layer of the hide is used to make a full grain leather pocket.
0コメント