The frame for the mirror was constructed from an outer loop of leather, made out of a 74mm wide strap. Within this, a 6mm mirror was sandwiched between two thinner 34mm retaining loops. The frame being hung from a 32mm strap stitched to the frame.
in order to hide some of the stitching on the inside of the frame, the hanging straps were stitched to the outer loop first. Therefore when the retaining loops and mirror were fitted they covered the strap’s stitching on the inside of the outer loop.
The main construction decisions were whether to bond the inner retaining loops to the outer loop and how to keep the visible stitching as neat as possible, as both sides would be visible around the perimeter. Typically one side of a saddle stitch is not as aesthetically pleasing as the other as the stitches do not lie at such slanted angle.
Part of the reason for this is that each stitch hole is made at a slanted angle of approx 45 degrees, sloping up from left to right. However, viewed from the other side, the slant is sloping the other way. One way to overcome this is to pre-make the stitching holes in the outer loop and retaining loops independently prior to bonding them together. However this creates two problems: i) due to the thickness of the leather, the circumference of the outer loop is approx 50mm greater than the retaining loops, which equates to a difference of a dozen stitches and ii) when the loops are bonded together the glue is likely to get into some of the stitching holes and make passing the needles through much harder.
The diameter of the outer loop is 508mm giving a circumference of 1596mm, or 399 stitches at 4mm. The retaining loops diameter is only 492mm so a circumference of 1546mm, or 386 4mm stitches. However by dropping the stitch length down from 4mm to 3.85mm for the retaining loop, the stitch count drops to 401. The two additional stitches can easily with dropped stitches. Any problematic or blocked holes could be opened up with an awl where necessary
I decided not to bond the front retaining loop as this would make it impossible to replace the mirror if it ever was damaged, preferring to use double sided tape. Therefore the stitching can just be undone to allow the front retaining loop to be removed, freeing the mirror.
Glass: 500mm diameter, 6mm thickness, rounded edges from Glasstops UK – with hindsight 4mm glass would have been more than sufficient and would have avoided unnecessary weight
Leather: Wickett & Craig English Bridle in Medium Brown – 3.8/4.2mm
Thread: Cream/JK6 0.6mm Tiger Thread at 4mm spacing and 3.85 for the smaller retaining loops
Fortunately the Wickett & Craig bridle leather is supplied in half-hides so it has sufficient length to make the loops for the frame with a single length of leather, therefore avoiding having multiple joins.I wasn’t sure whether to hide the joint by skiving each end to make the outer retaining loop or make a feature of it. in the end I chose the latter and made a butt joint with cross-hatch stitchingThe mirror will be held up by a three sectioned 32mm strap, joined by buckles. The lower two sections will be stitched to retaining loop.Two back stitches are made at the buckle ends to strengthen the jointThree piece hanging strap with keeper loops, prior to fitting to the outer loop Sanding the surface of the leather to improve the bonding of the strapsFitting the hanging strap now allows the inside stitching to be hidden by the retaining loopsThe retaining loop is a tight fit inside the outer loop which makes bonding tricky, as the glue forms a strong bond on contact. Once the glue had been applied, strips of greaseproof paper were positioned between the two loops to allow everything to be moved around and positioned correctly. The greaseproof paper could then be removed in sections to make the gluing process much more controllable.The stitching holes are slanted at an angle of 45 degrees, rising from left to right, which results in the typical slanted stitching line.By making the stitching holes independently in the outer and (here) retaining loops, the same upwards from left to right slant is achieved on both sides. Therefore forcing the stiching line to have the same slanted appearance on both sides.This illustrates the difference in appearance between making the stitching holes from both sides (top row of stitches) and just from the outer side (bottom row). The latter has the holes slanting the other way, downwards from left to right, which causes the stitching line to slant the other way and be much flatterTrial fitting the mirror by placing the leather frame around the mirror, where it could be raised to meet the retaining loop by placing over the corner of a work surfaceRear retaining loop in position. Each retaining loop requires 12 metres of thread! To make it (marginally) more manageable for hand stitching it was easier to stitch in two halves A cylindrical sander was used to level the joint between the inner and outer loops before appling a brown edge dyeThe front retaining loop was secured with double sided tape so it could be removed, in case the mirror ever needs replacingInner and outer loops post sanding, edge dying and burnishing The completed mirror!
