Leather leaf tutorial, Part 2

Here is the second part of my leather leaf tutorial. This part is about dying or coloring and protecting the leaf and then attaching the brooch back or hair clip.

If you want to have a look at Part 1 of this tutorial then click on this link

https://thekimkatcollection.wordpress.com/2016/06/09/leather-leaf-tutorial-part-1/

This is what I have used:

An old paint brush,

a clean rag, cut a bit off to keep clean for when we glue the hair clip.

acrylic paint leather,

Eco chestnut tan leather dye,

Super Sheene (available from leather supply shops),

Super glue Flex (the rigid drying one will crack off when the leather bends)

a metal brooch pin and

a hair clip.

I have a spelling mistake on the video! Ah! It’s Super Sheene.

A Boho Hippie Turquoise Leaf Hairclip

I wanted to have a boho hippie used look on one of the leaves which is to be a hair clip.

I chose turquoise and silver to make it stand out from my red hair.

Using turquoise leather paint I rubbed it in to try to get the paint into the veins.

Then I used silver leather paint and rubbed in in and removed some so that the turquoise was visible.

While the paint was drying I did the second leaf I had handtooled.

Chestnut tan and Gold Brooch

I used leather dye on this leaf. Usually when I dye things I use a felt pad, a dauber, to drag the dye along the leather more evenly but since this was only small I am using an old paint brush to paint the dye on. Be careful with your fingers or you may have brown fingers all day.

I painted the dye on, then let it dry and then painted some gold leather paint on and rubbed it so some of the leather colour shows through and the veins are still dark.

Once the paint is dry you need to protect the leather with Super Sheene. You can get this online or at leather supply shops.

You paint it on and then buff it. You can do more than 1 layer to get a really glossy finish.

I only did 1 layer.

For the hairclip, I used super glue FLEX, it’s important not to use the normal superglue because as the clip bends so much either way the normal glue just cracks and the clip comes off. I also glued some of the clean rag around the clip to help hold the clip on. Hold the leather against the clip until it is almost dry to push the leather into the curve of the clip. But don’t glue yourself on like I nearly did.

With the leaf brooch I used the same glue and a brooch back and just glued it on. I used a stick to push it down whilst it was drying. Be careful not to get glue into the workings of the brooch fastener or you may not be able to open and close it.