Spent a whole weekend fighting with a single headband

I was making a leather-bound journal for a client in Seattle and the headband just would not sit right. It took me about 14 hours over two days to get the stitching tight and the curve perfect, mostly because I was using a new, thinner linen thread. Has anyone else had a headband fight back that hard, and what thread do you trust for them?

3 comments

3 Comments

kim9632mo ago

Try waxed linen thread, it grips the leather better.

holly_henderson862mo ago

Oh man, that is so true. My buddy was fighting with some regular thread on a belt project last month, kept slipping and making messy stitches. He finally switched to waxed linen and it was like night and day. He said it just pulled through clean and tight, no more fraying or loose loops. That grip makes all the difference for keeping everything lined up. He finished that belt in one sitting after he changed threads.

oscar_ellis1mo ago

Wait, 14 hours on one headband? @holly_henderson86, I gotta ask - did you try tightening your tension at all? Sometimes when I'm using a new thread like that, I hold the thread closer to the needle and tug it a bit more as I pull through each stitch. Helps keep everything from loosening up and fighting back. That linen thread sounds like it was just too slick for the curve work, right?