Hi, I'm Jim Linnell with Tandy Leather.
I'm going to be showing you how to make a wallet
and I'll be going through each of the steps,
with each of the tools,
in enough detail so that you'll know how
to get the best results out of your leatherwork.
Now that we have all of our parts cut out, formed, shaped,
we've got the creases on the edges,
we now need to color them.
And I'm going to use the same product we used to do the inlay dye.
I'm going to use the same medium-brown waterstain.
That way our interior is going to match the dye that we put in the background
on our project as well.
So, I've got some more of it here in our dish.
And there's no real trick to this.
We're going to use a dauber, a wool dauber.
And I've got just some papers,
craft paper here underneath my projects
so that I can just apply it and not have to worry about
am I going to get it on the table.
Put a good coat on it.
And most people would probably want to look at the inside
and see if the inside of these pockets is the same color of the outside.
So let's dye both sides of it.
And of course, we want to dye these edges.
I'm picking up this wet, dyed piece of leather,
and I'd be staining my fingers real good.
So that's why I went and put some of these plastic gloves on.
It helps a bit.
But once you have a coat on there, just set that aside, grab another one,
we'll just get all of these pieces stained up so that the interior
will match the exterior of our project.
Once that's dry, we will put a finish over the top of it as well.
We'll use that same super sheen over the top
so they have a nice, glossy finish as well.
Remember when you're doing this to get the edges as well.
That's real important.
You don't want any light-colored edges
showing on your finished project.
Notice I put the dye on with circular motions.
Sometimes-- and again, this one of the things
I do like about this dye.
It is easy to get this waterstain on fairly consistently.
But sometimes, if you put your dye on
by just putting a lot of streaks on like this,
you get that kind of a pattern to come through in your dye results.
So if you put your dye on with a circular motion like this,
you'll end up with a lot more consistent color--
a consistent coverage with your color.
On these pieces that you've formed after you've got the dye on them,
make sure you let them dry all folded up again,
so that they are in the general shape you want them in
when you get ready to assemble this.
Fold this one back up, make sure that it dries like that.
Here we have all of our pieces stained with the medium-brown waterstain
and we need to put them aside and let them dry.
It's usually best to let them dry overnight as I mentioned earlier.
Always let each one of these steps dry completely
between each next finish or application that you put on it.
We'll let these dry and then we'll put on a super sheen finish over the top of them,
before we do the final assembly.
Now that we've given our wallet interior enough time for the dye to dry,
it's time to put a finish on it.
Again, we'll go back to that super sheen, it's a great finish for this.
It'll give us a nice, polished, interior in our wallet.
And again, we'll use this high-density sponge to do this.
Here we just need a light coat on here.
So, we would put this on and just go over real quickly
and give it a light coat and let those dry.
I guess we can put it on the other side as well
just so that'll dry with a little bit harder finish as well.
It's not necessary on that one.
We'll do it on this piece as well.
I know folks sometimes have had problems with dyes smearing and things like that,
but I want you to notice that there's no dye coming off on my sponge.
And this is dried for a good period of time here.
That's just one of the great things about this waterstain.
You just don't have those issues.
One other thing we can do if you want to add
just one more little special touch, to your wallet interior.
Why your leather is still moist from the super sheen
you can take like this folding tool we used,
something with a slick finish.
This works pretty good this bison horn folder.
And these edges like on this pocket-- the edges that will be exposed
after this is assembled,
you can rub over it with a little bit of friction here,
and you can burnish it.
You can get a nice polished finish on there.
In fact, when this has dried a little bit,
we'll actually put some edge finish on there.
So like on these pieces here, the pieces that would have these edges
exposed on the interior of your wallet, we can give those a nice finish.
This is primarily the one's that we ran the creaser over.
Give them a nice polished finish.
I don't know if that shows up there.
But it's just another step in making a more professional looking
finished wallet.
We'll also be able to see the top edge and the bottom edge of this
so let's go ahead and do that as well.
We have a divider too that will go in there.
So let's do that top edge that will be seen.
Again, because this is a veg tan piece of leather,
because it's moist, it's moist from the super sheen,
it will slick up, polish up real nice.
To give that one more extra touch to our wallet interior,
I'm going to use some of this Edgeflex,
which is-- I'm using a clear finish.
I've got some poured in a dish here.
It's just a clear finish that we'll be putting on
the edge of our polished edges there.
And I'm going to use one of these mini daubers,
they work real good for retaining or keeping
the edge finish right on the edge rather than having it spill over.
And what this will do, it will give it a harder finish.
It will give it a little bit of a glossy finish.
And just paint that on and let that dry.
And like I said, it's one more of those little touches
that we can give our project to give it more of a professional look.
See, it gives it a better shine that that.
Most of that shine will stay as that dries.
We will let that edge finish dry.
Then we'll assemble this and get it ready to go into our wallet.
Thank you for joining me today.
Be sure and check back often here at our blog
and we'll show you more tips and ideas
on how to get the most fun out of your leatherwork.