Edition Eight Feature
Words by: Sarah Garvey
Location: Clarkdale, Arizona, USA
Photo Credit: ©Lyndsey Garber @lyndseygarber

Leatherworker Sarah Garvey finds inspiration for her finely tooled leather handbags in the landscape and cultures of the American Southwest. Never one to repeat a design, she takes her drawing bag everywhere, sketching out new ideas for Western Skies Handmade.

Describe your work, your methods, your challenges…

I am a leatherworker – my focus is tooled leather, mainly handbags. It’s an artform that I’ve completely fallen in love with, and I love the challenges and possibilities that it brings. I’ve always been a bit of a purse girl, but I could never afford the really nice handbags. So I started making my own!

Starting out, I found that a lot of the purses available in tooled leather were typically made by people who didn’t carry purses or didn’t think about blending form and function together. That’s what I really enjoy doing: not only making something that’s pretty, but also something that actually functions well in everyday life.

It’s a challenge sometimes. The vegetable-tanned leather that I use has a lot more structure than many other commonly used materials. That really does limit the approach that you can take, especially if you’re trying to use a machine. Hand-sewing gives you a little more freedom, but you definitely can’t easily do any purse design that you see in a retail store.