04/17/2026
My attempt at carving and tooling a belt. I got into leather work by having a need (or want) for making watch straps. I tried to concentrate on my edge work and stitching which was pretty good. I never thought I'd get into tooling and such but it's pretty fun yet very disappointing. You put in all the hard work and can screw it up with decorative cuts at the end...like I did. It wasn't that great to begin with but it was about worth keeping. I've never been good at this as I don't have a lot of practice and this was the first time in over 3 years since I've had a chance to do any leather work so I'm hoping it'll improve some as I practice. I believe that I need hands on advice and/or guidance.
It still has some work to be done but the look is all pretty much set so it can only get worse from here as I finish it off. It hurts hating your own work. Like some other things, maybe I'll look back in a few years and think it looks better. For some reason that happens. I'll be like....I made that? Wow. That's pretty nice but at the time of making it, I thought it was really bad. Hopefully that's somewhat normal, idk.
