I recently put a finish coat on the first of a new series of Pepper Mills I’ve been working on for the last few weeks. This one is made in salvaged Queensland Maple and stands about 31 cm tall (approx. 12 inches). The internal grinding mechanism is made in Denmark by CrushGrind and is the best you can buy … ceramic grinding surfaces with nylon, stainless steel and aluminium hardware … nothing to rust … and, providing an adjustable grind from coarse to very fine. Stay tuned.

Meet the Workshop Dog … This is Misty. She’s an American Bulldog X Catahoula.

Misty is patiently waiting for me to stop doing all this completely unimportant stuff in the workshop and start focusing on something a lot more important … like … WALK!!!

This year I have started to do a bit of leather crafting and have scaled back a little on some of the work I’ve been doing with wood for the last 20 years or so. It’s something I’ve been interested in for a long time but have never committed to pursuing working with leather seriously.

I think leather is a really interesting medium because its soft and pliable like fabric (and 2 dimensional) yet, at the same time, exhibits many of the qualities of a three dimensional solid … including some of the limitations. Also, coming from a background containing lots of wood, I’m seeing characters in the leather which are familiar to me as grain and figuring in wood … though, which might not necessarily be how traditional leatherworkers view leather.

To date, I’ve been making some leather journal covers, phone pouches and a couple bags and a few smaller items. I’ve spent a lot of time getting my technique up to a level of quality that I’m happy with and everything I’ve made so far has been hand-stitched (two-needle saddle stitch).

Here’s one of a couple leather belt pouches I made recently. This is hand-stitched and made from fairly heavy weight leather … approx. 6oz (2.5 mm thick). The black leather is “Kip” boot leather and the gold is mill-finished upholstery stock. I didn’t make the belt … it’s an old favourite from 20-odd years ago.

I really like the texture in the black leather … the stretch marks in the hide that bring some of the life of the animal who donated it to the end product. I think coming from a background of working with wood I’m drawn to the parts of leather hides, especially around the edges, that might not get used by traditional leather crafters. The smooth unblemished leathers obtained from purpose-bred animals seen in high fashion definitely have their place … but so too does the more textural and seemingly less perfect leather animals who’ve seen a more normal existence.

I’ve been tweaking the design of this spoon a bit lately and reckon I have it how I like it now. It’s a shallow stirring spoon based on my “Bev” Traditional Spatula / Stirrer. So far, I’ve only been making them as right-handers but plan to offer the design in left-handed configuration as well … just have to think in reverse.