Q. Tell me about Gusset Leather.

Gusset Leather is a small business specializing in custom leather work. Gusset Leather is owned and operated by myself, Keegan Lodder, out of my home in Dundas, Ontario.

The name, Gusset, refers to the part of a bag, or other 3 dimensional piece, between the front panel and the back panel – which gives a bag width and depth. I chose this name because the majority of my work involves custom bag-making—and because when I was choosing a name I only had 2 weeks until my first trade show and I needed to decide on something!

Gusset Leather debuted in 2014 at SuperCrawl in Hamilton. It was a last minute commitment but I managed to show up to the event with 20-30 items and I was blown away by the interest and support from the local Hamilton community.

Each Gusset Leather product prioritizes functionality and durability over ornamentation while allowing the leather to speak for itself to combine for a pleasing aesthetic. Working with raw materials requires striking a delicate balance between manipulating your material and showcasing what is already there—in all of my work it is my goal to bring the beauty of leather to the fore.

My main focus is custom work, however, I do maintain an online shop on this website featuring some of my more popular designs which I update as often as the inspirations and materials come to me. You can check that out here.

Q. What made you want to work with leather?

Prior to the beginning of my undergraduate degree in 2011 I was looking for a quality messenger bag for commuting to and from school. I was coming off of a summer job as a stonemason and, with a pretty sore and messed up back, I was searching for a bag with a wide, supportive leather shoulder strap to minimize strain on my spine.

Around the same time, a good friend of mine introduced me to a small leather shop in Hamilton, Ontario called Tundra Leather. I visited Tundra and the great staff there directed me to the necessary supplies and provided the advice I needed to attempt to make my own bag out of leather. After a steep, uphill battle my first leather project was eventually completed (pictured right) and, after lots of practice, I began taking on small custom orders here and there for friends and family. I suppose when you walk around with a leather bag that looks handmade there are people who will ask you about it; eventually it all just sort of ‘snowballed’ into more and more leatherwork for me – and I wasn’t about to complain.

Almost all of my work experience has been in trades—starting in stonemasonry and then moving into landscape construction which I still currently do full-time during the summer months. My experience in trade-specific work has revealed to me the importance of attention to detail and the satisfaction of working with my hands.

Gusset Leather home studio in Dundas, ON

Like any other trade, leather working requires a lot of creativity but also a lot of industry and I think this is why what I thought would be ‘just a hobby’ eventually turned into the small business it is today—it just sort of ‘stuck’ for me. Some days involve a kind of rhythmic repetition in production – I may be making hundreds of the same simple item or repeating a certain technique over and over again. But there are also days which may be completely spent making just one custom piece with multiple different elements requiring creativity, innovation, and problem solving skills more so than technical training. Half of what I do focuses on efficient skilled labour and the other half presents an opportunity to translate abstract ideas and concepts into real, tangible objects. I think these two aspects of craftsmanship, creativity and industry, come together in leatherworking in an entirely unique way which I have been excited about since that first bag I made.

Q. So, is it handmade?

Each Gusset Leather item is made using traditional tools and methods—patterning, cutting, edge finishing, and most aspects are all completed using hand tools. All of my wallets feature hand-stitched construction while most of our bags and purses are sewn on a machine where possible. Each and every Gusset Leather item passes through one set of hands from start to finish.

I believe that working by hand affords the opportunity to achieve the highest measure of precision and the best understanding of the material I am using which, in turn, results in the best possible quality and longevity. You learn a lot about any given piece of leather simply by handling it––a piece of leather might look good from a distance, but the only way to fully understand its features and imperfections is to work with it by hand, For these reasons I gladly offer a lifetime warranty on all of my work.

I personally design all Gusset Leather products from scratch and each is made from the highest quality full-grain leathers available to me.