A guy walks into a harness shop in 1750 Boston and wants to order a fowler hunting bag. The Harness Maker will make the bag using the techniques he learned over the years making harness.
A Guy walks into a shoemaking shop in 1750 Boston and orders a bag, and the shoemaker is going to use the techniques he has learned over the years making shoes.
Both are likely to make a good product, but if there is one pronounced difference between the two craftsmen it would be in the use of forms. The shoemaker depended on the last maker for wooden forms, almost always made of wood duplicating the human foot. So he was used to working with wood.
The culture exchange is interesting, here. A customer asks for a bag, the shoemaker might make a wooden block to help form the pouch. Another guy sees the shoemakers wooden block and decides he will give it a go and save a few pence.
A wooden block is always useful if you are going to wet form a bag, and it is a simple tool to make. Generally, in the case of hunting bags, I’ll make it of a size where the distance to the edge of the leather pattern is about three quarters the width of the wood;
That way it will allow for stitching and fit in and out easily;
It’s chief virtue is that it makes the stitching job easier because it will hold the piece firmly and evenly in the clamp;
Originally I was going to kluge this little belt bag by wet molding it around the block. Then I second guessed it and decided to expand the space in the pouch. So I decided on a gusset;
A Gusset, here, separates the front face and back part of the pouch. It acts kind of like a floor in the base of the pouch. The chief value of a gusset, especially one that does not travel all the way around the bag but ends up short of the throat, is that it adds storage space without expanding the footprint of the bag. Look again at that picture of the bag in the clamp. You can see where the front and back parts of the pouch meet near the throat just after the corner…in other words, this gusset expands the bottom of the pouch.
Once turned inside out after stitching, the narrower throat of the bag will assist in keeping the contents of the pouch in place as they settle on the bottom where the gusset is stitched in and contents don’t overflow.
To make your stitching easier by holding the edges together firmly, run your glue around edges of the seam for about an eighth of an inch in from each edge. This is a job for contact cement as opposed to a glue you might use to keep your bag liner attached to the leather. Hirschkleber is good for the latter, whereas something like Wellwood contact cement will hold your edges in place in the clamp when you work your awl and needles.
Every so often, when I post onsite with my shoebench, someone who works with leather will stop by and immediately stand out as such with the caliber of their questions. The newbies will almost always ask what the difference between a welt and a gusset is.
If you are starting out in leatherwork, or just want to cobble something in a one off, keep this in mind;
The Gusset expands the pouch. A welt does no such thing, but adds durability and uniformity to a seam. It is simple a strip of leather that separates the front and back of the pouch by sitting between them. Each stitch passes through the welt. When making a pair of shoes a welt is sewn into the inner sole and upper around the last and will eventually attach the outer sole. In the case of a pouch, it is almost essential to reinforce the seam.
Take a look at this picture of a bag made by TC Albert as used in one of my earlier posts;
When that bag stretches out with use it will make that seam a little more uniform than it already is, and keep it even to boot.
Now look at this little kluge job I did to make the point with my Singer Patcher. I used the machine because all sewing machines have needles inherently larger that the gauge of the thread used, unlike hand sewn seams, so in this case it helps the visual. Note how the gusset bulges a little too much because there is no welt. It may never expand evenly. See those little white dots along the seam? Lacking a welt a seam like that will eventually expose the thread, albeit here dramatically, and allow the pouch to expand unevenly.
As with shoes and an unknown number of destroyed hunting bags, one of the chief reasons for wear and discard is a seam that gave out. Whether or not intended as such, a welted seam will resist that demise.
Tight Stitches
The Capgun Kid
