SCA A&S project exporing how and why the ubiquitous kidney belt pouch developed its iconic shape
Overview
Why?
I started looking into period foorwear finding “Stepping through Time” by Olaf Goubitz and discovering “Purses in Pieces” and design question began to form aroung why that kidney bean shape. I was also finding comments about the cost of materials, efficiency and fruggleness of leather craft, and the usage of purses and things started to not connect. Why would leather worker cut a pattern from a valuable resource that could easily turn 10-20% of that resourse into waste?
I suspect that these purses started life as rectangles and molded into their iconic shape through wear and use. Later on through industrialization and prosperity they may have adopted the kidney shape during contruction as the longer slenderer bolluck bags came along a little later on.
Modern Support
Approaching this as modern leather worker and leveraging knowledge of tannage types and hide cutting, the bag shape just doesn’t make sense as a commodity item. Building patterns to match the well worn extant examples is very wasteful of the leather and adds complexity to the cutting.
Leather when under load and moisture will stretch to a point.
Human behavior would dictate that purses were:
– exposed to body fluids, wide range of humidity, actual soaking (rain, water crossings, etc).
– left on a belt and hung or draped when not worn, leading to the purse folding in half along the vertical axis between the belt loops
– naturally worn on the side of the leg where it naturally divides the purse in 2 halves around the thigh
– latched, straped, layed, and stitch along the vertical center line preventing or limiting the leather from stretching relative the rest of the purse.
Blog Posts Covering My Progress
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Girdle Purse – Making test pieces
Finally clearing the work bench to work on the girdle purses. Starting with the simple efficient design that I’ll be referring to as the Square Body design. It’s a simple rectangle that 8.25 inches by 18ish inches. Three sides are straight and one narrow end can be left as the natural edge of the hide.…
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Girdle Purse – Pattern #1
Because I needed a larger and more practical pouch I went looking for a pattern for what I knew as a “Kidney Pouch”. More accurately termed a girdle purse. For modern life I need it to fit a cell phone, an battery bank, car keys, wallet, field notebook, writing implements, and have room for more…