This was originally posted on JMAucoin.com in December 2014.
On Saturday, I met up with a bunch of other friends at Tandy for a leather run. I had a good idea of what I wanted to get in terms of leather and tools, but was a little foggy in terms of specifics. Fortunately, the manager at Tandy was a huge help, and actually knew what a buff coat was (unlike my last trip to Tandy when I tried to make buff coat 1.0). Ended up leaving with two sides for the buff coat, lots of wax-linen thread, a curved awl blade, and some black scrap leather that I’m going to turn into the 17th Century cavalier”butterfly” boot-straps. A good, but expensive haul. Here’s what I’m using for the buff coat:
Body: 8-9oz Oak-Leaf Sides
Sleeves: 3-4oz Craftsman Oak Sides
Unlike sewing fabric or sewing a lot of other leather projects, the stitches on a buff coat a very different. There’s no right sides to right sides, sew, and turn right side out. Nor do you overlap one layer of leather on top of another and sew (like in my Edward Kenway cosplay). It uses a special butt-joint stitch in which you butt-end the two pieces of leather together and then make a hole that starts at the top of the leather but, instead of coming out at the bottom of the leather, it comes out of the side of the edge. Here’s a sketch from Osprey’s Ironsides: English Cavalry 1588-1688 (Warrior) book (great resource):

Continue reading 17th Century Buff Coat: Purchasing Leather, Butt-End Stitch Proof-of-Concept →