Thanks for the pics, Father Bill- you look absolutely smashing!
I love 'action pix' as I so rarely get to hand deliver my work.

Quote Originally Posted by HippieLee View Post
Outstanding - as always I am inspired by Artificer's work.

If I may ask (and if this is infringing on personal trade secrets/practices feel free to ignore - I truly do understand) how does one get the scalloped edges (is that even the right term?) around the trim? (and is that the part that makes it "brogue"?) I haven't really seen a tool for that at my local Tandy store but I am still very new to leather-work so I know I haven't seen all there is (and I also know that Tandy isn't the only place out there for this stuff - it's just the place near me and they have been pretty good to me so far in my learning.) It looks like it would be mighty tough to do each little cut out by hand lol....
Quote Originally Posted by Downunder Kilt View Post
Can't tell how the scalloped edges are done HippieLee, but the brogue part are all those little holes/indentations that make a pattern, as on a pair of brogue shoes.
Yup- Downunder's got it.

EDIT: Llama beat me to it.
No big secret, the scalloped edges (technically called pinking) are actually cut with a small pinking iron I made from a chisel. Each 'scallop' an individual strike with the mallet and chisel. Like I said, no big secret, just a fair bit of practice and patience.

You CAN buy ready made pinking irons, but they are ridiculously expensive- on the order of +$200/each, and given that I have 4 main styles of pinking and sizes that I use, it's a bit cost-prohibitive.

Likewise, there is a special broguing tool which will punch the larger hole AND the two 'flanking' holes in a single strike, but because it's a specialty tool ONLY used by bespoke shoe makers (and therefore the tool is not produced in any volume)
it runs almost $400US, and then you still need to buy the various heads for punching odd-size combinations. So all the the brogue holes are done individually by hand as well. Let's just say that I'm happy that I have a really nice set of compasses and wing dividers.

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