Why we love vegetable tanned leather.

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Cuero de curtido vegetal | La Portegna | Made in Spain

  

Understanding where and how our leather is done, is an important aspect of understanding our effort towards creating amazing quality handcrafted goods.

 

 

 

 

Over time you learn to appreciate good leather by holding the leather sample into your hand and releasing it on a table

  

 

Quality is about how something feels and makes us feel...


To deliver a beautiful handcrafted product you need to work with great quality leather capable of transmitting a beautiful visual and tactile sensation.  Understanding where and how our leather is done, is an important aspect of understanding our effort towards creating amazing quality handcrafted goods.
All of our leather comes from Spain specifically in a small village near Barcelona called Igualada. This town is famous for leather production. We work with a family owned leather tanning company specialized with vegetable tanned leather. 

  

We are absolute fans of working with vegetable tanned leather. 


Vegetable tanned leather is a lush leather that ages gracefully overtime. This leather is processed with natural tannings and then put in slow moving drums which are then  soaked with olive oil. It is an ecological friendly process.
It is not easy to spot quality leather. Good cowhide leather should be spotlessly clean with no spots, cuts or holes, this means that the cows have been wandering freely away from barbed wire. The leather tones should reflect depth and uniformity. Good leather tanneries tend to create very interesting colour palettes that project the visual power of leather.

An acid test that distinguishes quality leather from the rest is how the leather rests upon itself. A sample of Poor leather can either feel very upright or totally bland.
A Good leather sample must have what we call in Spanish “cuerpo” ( body) it is firm but gracious. Over time you learn to appreciate good leather by holding the leather sample into your hand and releasing it on a table, you can then observe if it has nice “cuerpo”. This test is critical because it will allow you to predict how the leather will behave over time.

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