#bootblack

Some of my favourite pics of me bootblacking at local leather events over the past year 🖤❤️‍🔥⛓️

Oh, how I love all the questions /genuine 💞💞

Okay!!!

So, leather is a skin, right?? It’s a hide. How do we care for our own skin?? Your basic steps:

Rinse

Clean

Rinse

Moisturize

A light spray of water, clean with a gentle soap (non-scented glycerin soap or saddle soap and a small horsehair/badgerhair brush), rinse and wipe off all the soap residue, and moisturize!

“Sen,” you say, “how do I moisturize leather?” Good question!! It’s going to depend on the type of leather.

There’s two big categories of leather; oil tan, and high shine. Oil tan leather is matte, soft, and more flexible (think of old leather dress shoes or casual boots). High shine leather is, well, self explanatory lol (shiny, less flexible, more glossy).

With oil tan leather, you’ll use a leather conditioner! Most bootblacks recommend Hubberd’s Shoe Grease (a heavier, denser conditioner), Obenauf’s Heavy Leather Preservative (more waxy), or Aussie Saddle conditioner (like Obenauf’s, but has a higher beeswax content). These are all pretty easily available online, and can even be bought in bulk and put into other containers!

For high shine leather, you use polish! There’s lots of different brands, but most folks get their start with Kiwi shoe polish (not super high quality, but readily available at big box stores like Walmart and Target). Most experienced bootblacks will use Lincoln or Angelus polish (your choice will depend on things like local humidity, altitude, experience, and technique). Apply a thin layer of polish to the boot, mist with a light spray of water, buff with a horsehair boot brush, and finish with a fine cotton buffing cloth!

It's probably just because the leather community as a whole tends to be a microcosm of society at large nowadays, but I see people posting flyers for events full of AI garbage; for bars, clubs, and larger events alike. Or they're posting some Tom of Finland looking AI generated sex homunculus with two left feet to get off to

I just find it especially hypocritical, since there's been some (absolutely valid!) conversations about not stealing other leatherworkers designs for belts and harnesses and such, and asking other leatherworkers for permission before even taking heavy inspiration from one of their designs, just for these same people to turn around and use AI to generate ads and images for them to post. They literally don't bat an eye when it comes to using the Stealing People's Art Machine as long as it's a medium they don't respect

yeah! in judaism leather is indicative of luxury and comfort—this is why we don't wear it on yom kippur (also prohibited is sex, so to me this feels like a pretty big arrow pointing to leathersex bc leather and sex are linked by being in this list of things we refrain from on yom kippur). more than that, though, some of the holiest things we have in judaism are leather! kosher klafs (scrolls) are a type of leather (tanned hide and all that) which includes the torah, what's in the mezuzah, and the scrolls in tefilin! and speaking of tefilin—black leather straps we bind ourselves with! more than that, traditionally the way to keep the leather moisturized and nice is to lay tefilin regularly and allow the oils from your skin to hydrate the leather. there's also ritualized leather care if it's damaged, you have like black dye and you say a little bracha before you use it to repair your tefilin

judaism imbues leather items with a sense of holiness, set-apart-ness that is similar to the more spiritual side of the leather community. leather spirituality often views leather as a material that it's important for helping us reach an altered state of mind, another 'self' if you want to put it that way. leathers have their own lives and they are treated with immense respect and reverence. for example, touching someone else's gear without permission is a HUGE no-no, it's a sign of disrespect to an extremely high degree. (this is why bootblacks are such an important and fascinating social role within the leather community; often they are the only person who will touch and handle a person's leather gear other than the leather's owner themself. to give your vest or harness or boots or whatever to a bootblack and walk away is such a huge action of trust, and as such bootblacks generally have a highly respected role in the community (i'd imagine kinda like book binders in communities who love really old books). see again the ritualized leather care with tefilin!)

Source details and larger version.

one of my personal favorites of all my collages. tribute to all servicers (tops, bottoms, doms, subs), butches, leather lovers and bootblackers