So how did I end up working with leather? Before leather, there was skateboarding. For close to three decades there was skateboarding, and it consumed most of my life. I spent countless hours learning new tricks, perfecting old ones, and traveling all over North America searching for places to skateboard. Skateboarding has chosen my friends, dictated my travels, and ruined my body. After so long, my ankles, back and hips decided they had taken enough of the abuse. Maybe you know how challenging, disheartening and frustrating it feels to only be able to daydream about what you love and not take part in it? For years, nothing captured my attention like skateboarding. Something else about me: I can’t settle for anything other than exactly what I want. From shoes, to shirts, to jeans, I won’t buy what’s out there if it’s not what I’m looking for. Maybe it’s a skateboarder mentality, not giving up until you land the trick. I have always had high standards as a consumer. I’m very picky and hold a particular idea of what I think makes a good product. Quality over quantity will always win. Having said that, it is just as important to me to make that quality product your own. I have always tailored products to my liking. I’ve used paint, pen, marker, sand paper, and even straight up cut off parts of shoes. Anything more advanced than my teenage tailoring would be left to my mom. My mother put up with a lot, dealing with my picky ways from such an early age. She would forever be taking things in, adding pockets, hemming jeans, moving buttons, taking a tag from one shirt and sewing it onto another; I would change everything and anything to make it mine. I think that’s the secret to life, find something you like and make it your own. So, in September of 2013 I needed a new belt and when I couldn’t find the one I was picturing in my head, I figured I could probably just make it myself. Everything out there was too wide and made from leather I knew wouldn’t last. So I found a place to purchase a cowhide and cut the leather to the width I wanted my belt to be. It took me months to find a buckle I liked and even longer to figure out how to edge my belt. But, as it turns out, I loved every moment of it. Working with leather quickly became my new escape. I had finally found something else that I could loose myself to, like I had with skateboarding. The belts I sell in my store are made from the same template I used to make my first belt. I use vegetable-tanned, full grain leather and handpick every piece of leather from my distributors. My pickiness and attention to detail goes into the design and workmanship, however it is you, the customer, who gets to make the product your own. If you want to have a belt that is 100% yours and yours only, the veg tan is the way to go. In a few months your belt will start to darken and take on characteristics unique to your daily routine. A year from now the leather will become a darker brown and truly be one of a kind. Skateboarders, musicians, artists, people in the trades, chefs or computer folk will all wear their belt in very differently. Like I said, taking something and making it your own is a code I live by, which is the great part about this leather endeavor; I just start the process and it is up to you, the customer, who finishes it off. Through everyday wear, each product will become your own. And when it comes to the canine items, special things happen fast as their fur oils work in to the leather quickly creating a collar as special and unique as your dog! These products don’t wear out, they wear in!
