Making a "High Roller" Caiman Crocodile Wallet. An Armadilloman Photo Blog
Occasionally I get a commission to make a dramatic "High Roller" exotic hide wallet. For this wallet I chose caiman crocodile in a "bone" finish and planned to make a croc interior as well as a back. A nice caiman hide is pricey so you really have to plan carefully and know what you are doing before you start cutting-- just a warning for you out there who want to try this at home. Caiman is not the most difficult stuff to work with, but it's not as easy as cowhide either The techniques shown here can be adapted to making a wallet from any exotic leather...snake, lizard, ostrich, shark etc.
The first step is to lay out the hide and decide where you want to cut the wallet back.
Then take the wallet back pattern and find the center on the chosen portion of the hide. When I have the pattern positioned I take a awl and stab a hole at the center...
...then flip the hide over and mark that center with a sharpie.
Use the center marks to position the pattern for the back and draw around with a fine point sharpie.
Smear contact cement inside the back shape drawn on the hide and apply glue to a piece of, in this instance, goatskin to use as a lining for the wallet back.
When the glue has partially dried, press the lining piece to the caiman hide. The lining is a pre-colored piece of goat skin.
Then break out the leather shears and carefully cut around the lining shape.
The pockets are simply drawn out on the back of the hide...
...and cut out...
...and glued to a piece of thin pig skin lining leather.
All of the pockets are cut and glued in similar manner. This wallet is to be minimalist in that it has only 3 pockets to save it from being too thick and to present the caiman in the most dramatic fashion. Here are all the parts finished...the pockets, the interior back and the wallet back.
Contact cement is spread around the inside edges of the pockets and the interior back.
The pockets are glued in place on the interior back.
A guide line is drawn on the hide with a erasable white pen and the stitching holes carefully punched. The hide is uneven and it is difficult to punch these in a straight line.
The interior top edge is stitched together first.
The interior is glued to the back along the bottom and side edges and hand stitched together.
After the wallet is all stitched up, the edges are leveled with a Dremel rotary tool with a coarse sanding wheel attached. Then the edges are colored, burnished and finished.
And the wallet is complete.
Do you want a "High Roller" Caiman wallet of your very own to carry those Benjamins and Chase Sapphire card? That will be 250 SBD please. Plus shipping.
Please ask questions you have.
Great project there and an interesting read. Once made a leather coaster but your work is way better. I don't see any place in that wallet to store bitcoins though 😸
Thanks @crypticat! No bitcoin purse, but one could be made to hold a ledger nano.
Hi armadilloman,
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That's a gorgeous piece of hide! Love the final product as well. What do you use to dye the edges?
Thanks! Dyeing the edges is...tricky. The dye can't migrate into the leather. Just an undiluted Tandy water dye to start and finish with a specific paint, Fiebings Edge coat, to finish it.
howdy there @armadilloman! that's a very unusual high-end wallet for sure, excellent work! what's the most expensive type of hide that you work with so I'll know what to order next time!
Nile Crocodile and Ameirican Alligator @janton, is pricey stuff. And rattlesnake. Order any of those, and I will make you suffer financially for it.
lol! "make you suffer financially for it." but it would be SO worth it!
The Nile Crocodile and the Alligator I can see, especially the Nile Crocodile
but I figured the rattlesnake would be a dime a dozen!
Good, big, wide rattlesnake with nice bright diamonds is 3-5 bucks an inch my cost! And to do a rattlesnake inside and out wallet takes 20-24 inches. But yes, Nile crocodile is quite a bit more then that.
very interesting Armadilloman! I think I'll go for the Nile Crocodile then!
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That wallet looks nice .. its cool seeing all the steps to its creation.
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I'm sorry about crocodiles
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