Hand Stitching Leather

 Hand Stitching is not difficult!

In this post I am going to consolidate all my published work on stitching leather by hand. After related blog posts have been incorporated here, I will delete the originals. 

The first video shows classic saddle stitch where two needles and an awl is in your hands - the leather is clamped in a stitching pony or, as in this video, a stitching clam:

 

In the next video, I show the simplest method of hand sewing with one needle on the end of the thread only and the project is held in one hand - for when you do not have a stitching clamp/pony:

 

 Stitching something large with two needles and no stitching pony/clamp:

 

And here is how I keep that piece of leather stable while I work: 

 

From primitive video times, a few seconds to show how the center post of the tool glides against the edge of the leather. The tool is held at a 45 degree angle to give the small hole in the elbow piece the best chance of cutting the groove..

In this blog post from long ago, you can see a sky hook that my friend Tommy McLintic designed and published: Tommy's Sky Hook 

First published April 2017
Updated 24 October 2019