Magnetic Hat Keeper

I've been working with a CO2 laser engraver/cutter for a few years now. Most recently I've stepped up to a 60W CO2 with a 28"x20" (700mm x 500mm) work area. My wife, in preparation for a few up coming trips, started asking me about making a custom magnetic hat clip that she could attach to her purse. I had expressed an interest in dabbling in leatherwork with my laser so I thought that I would give it a go. I also had cut some simple earrings for her for a Christmas present.

• 2-3oz veg tan leather
• leather dye
• 1 leather rivet
• various leatherworking tools
• Clip of choice
• My wife chose this one
• 2 Magnets

The first thing that I wanted to do was to understand exactly what she wanted versus material I already had on hand. I already had some leatherworking tools and accessories along with some fairly strong magnets. I already had these laying around because I use them to hold down material on my laser bed. I tested the holding strength of two of the magnets between two pieces of 2-3oz leather. The magnets held pretty well and putting a hat in the middle held well too.

Knowing the dimensions of the magnets that I was working with and the dimensions of the ring that the leather was going to loop around, I started laying out the design. You can use whatever method that you want to design the leather pattern. Since I planned on cutting and engraving this on my laser cutter I used Lightburn to create the pattern. You could use Inkscape, AI, or other software as well.

I laid out reference geometry to represent the magnets as well as stich lines and center lines. I added the stitch holes. I didn't want the leather to be able to slide laterally on the ring so I added hole of a rivet. This also gave me an excuse to buy more tools, which is never a bad thing. I purchased a rivet kit off of Amazon.

Once I got the design the way that I wanted it, I headed to this website to help me design a monogram to add to it.

Back in Lightburn, I duplicated the design and added the monogram to one side of it.

Not much to describe here. If you're like me and use a laser cutter, you'll have to do a couple of things.

1. Know your laser.
2. If you have never cut leather before, or even leather at this thickness, you'll want to run some test cuts to know your power and speed settings to use for both the cutting and engraving.
3. Have good ventilation. It doesn't smell that horrible but there is a smell to burning leather that some may find unpleasant.
4. Once cut, clean your leather. It is going to have some soot on it from the laser cutting.
5. I ran mine under some cool water and used a toothbrush to get rid of the soot, especially over the engraving.
6. After the design was cut I ran a bevel tool around the edges. This step isn't necessary but in my opinion it helps with the aesthetics of the piece.
7. While the leather was drying, I placed the two halves together and folded them, just as they would be assembled. Then I placed the stem part of the rivet through the holes. I figured that would allow the outer piece the ability to stretch a little so that all four of the rivet holes would meet sort of cleanly.

Once the leather was clean and dry, it's time to dye.

For me, dip dying is the easiest. It's fast and you get an even dye on the leather. I used one of these tubs that I picked up from a Dollar Tree for just over a $1 USD. Pour some of the dye into the tub. I made sure that there was kind of a pool so that the leather could be submerged. Make sure that you use some rubber gloves when doing this as to not dye your hands as well.

This was the tricky & fun part. I don't have any pictures of this process as I am writing this after I did the project.

1. Feed the two leather halves through whichever ring your going to attach it around. I went with the larger of the two rings so that feeding the two halves through would be easier.
2. To make it easier to add the magnets during the sewing process, I marked one side of each with a sharpie so that I knew which sides to face towards the other.
3. Sew each side of the two halves together using a saddle stitch, adding the magnet just over half way through of each side.
4. Finish it off with the rivet to keep the ring in place and from sliding laterally.