My original music case was only the second leather item I ever made – the classic metal bar case. Many are made using a single piece of leather forming the front, rear and closing flap with two side gussets. However these rarely stand upright so the one I made had the gusset running the full length of the sides and bottom of the case with separate front and rear & closing flap panels. A slightly thinner leather was used for the gusset to make the construction easier, as the edges need to bend through 90 degrees along the stitch line.

I was asked to make another one but with the addition of a shoulder strap, with the final choice being Metropolitan Leather’s dark tan Lamport hide and a Wimbledon green suede lining. One modification I will make is to reinforce the base and sides. Over time the original case has mellowed and lost some of the rigidity of the leather-only base, so it not longer sits well on its feet. As the bag will incorporate a shoulder it made sense to strengthen the sides as well. So the plan is to use reinforcement panels between the leather and suede; a hard rigid panel for the base and bonded leather up the sides.

Leather: Metropolitan Lamport Shoulder in Dark Tan – front & rear panels in 2.0-2.5mm and gusset, bar straps & handle in 1.5mm
Thread: 0.6mm or #5 Vinymo, Colour 145 with 3.25mm stitch length

The top edge of the front panel will have a rolled edge which requires the edge to be skived quite thinly to enable the leather to be folded over the suede. At this stage only the top couple of inches of the suede was bonded to the leather.
An 8mm seam allowance was needed for the rolled edge.
The straps for the metal bar were made from the thinner 1.5mm hide folded over
With hindsight I wouldn’t recommend pre-punching the stitch holes as the contact adhesive bonds the holes shut and also, unless the holes line up perfectly on the front and back, it’s a struggle to get the needles through.
Locking pins are ideal for securing the straps in order to stitch them to the front panel
Some thin reinforcement tape was used to cover the stitches on the inside with the aim of stopping the stitched area showing through the suede.
The remainder of the suede lining can then be bonded to the outer leather. Masking tape was used to cover the outer 3-4mm around the edge as the suede will be skived away to avoid a bulky join.
Rolled edge over suede gives a much neater finish to the top edge
The stitch holes were punched to provide a guide for skiving the suede. The suede from the inner most point of the stitch hole to the edge was removed to avoid a bulky joint.
The shape of the shoulder strap mounting loops was matched to the curved handle ends. Note: again the end was skived to half thickness to reduce the bulk where it is stitched to the gusset.
The pieces for the bag gusset. Initially I planned that the screws to secure the bags feet passed through the stiffener and outer leather so small 4mm holes were pre-punched. However later I thought it would be neater to punch larger holes so the screws would be flush within the stiffener.
The conical solid brass feet need to be fitted first in order to hide the interior mounting screws.
With larger 10mm holes in the stiffener, the mounting screws are embedded in the stiffener and so won’t be as obvious once the suede has been bonded.
Areas which are bonded using contact adhesive need to be sanded to improve the bond.
Once all the fittings had been attached, the suede could be glued in place.
Unfortunately I’d lost the original pattern for the rolled handle so had to experiment with some alternative patterns.
I found the end of the first attempt (left) to be too large and looked a bit clumsy so adapted the template to a more tapered end. This resulted in a smaller more refined look.
I’ve found 10mm climbing rope as an ideal centre for the rolled handle.
The rope is first bonded to the centre line. After allowing to fully dry, contact adhesive is applied to the remaining exposed rope and leather. Once the adhesive is tacky the leather is formed tightly round the rope and clamped in place.
The Amy Roke clamping pliers are ideal for pulling the leather tightly around the rope before clamping.
It’s best to stitch the join before the contact adhesive is fully cured, as the stitching again pulls the leather more tightly around.
It was easier to bond the suede to the back panel and closing flap in three stages: i) the area from base to just below the mounting points for the handle (shown above), ii) the middle section up to the top of the gusset and ii) the closing flap. This is because the leather isn’t glued for the outer 4mm of the perimeter because it will be skived away.
Templates were made for both ends of the handle so the position of the required stitch holes could be transferred to the leather and punched.
Stitching on the handle is by far the hardest job as its extremely difficult to pass each needle through the two holes as the don’t readily align and the holes are hidden.
With the handle on, the middle section of suede can be bonded. Note: the masking of the outer 4mm around the edge which shouldn’t be glued and the use of very thin strengthening material to try to limit the thread showing through the suede.
The completed rear and closing flap panel with stitch holes punched
The outer 4mm of suede can then be skived from the area being joined to the gusset.
All the suede lining was given a coating of 3M Scotguard to provide a level of stain protection
The mistake I made with the first music bag was to make the gusset length equal to the perimeter of the front panel. Even though the stitch line is only 3mm in from the edge, this difference around the curved corners adds an additional 5mm in length per corner. This adds quite a lot of excess material to ‘blend in’. So this time I matched the gusset length around the curved section to the corresponding length of the front panel’s stitch line. This would make the stitching around the curve harder as the gusset is fighting against you but I think the end result is so much better this time.
Once the curved section was stitch, the remaining length of the side gusset can be matched to finish exactly at the top of the front panel.
Front panel attached to the gusset
The curved section of the gusset is much better than on my first music bag and the stiffener should stop the feet from splaying out as below.
A photo of the first music bag I made: the gusset is noticeably more bulky and the lack of a base stiffener has caused the feet to splay outwards.
Centralising the rear panel prior to bonding the 4mm of the edge and stitching