About Me and My Whips - a brief(ish) history.

My Aim

My aim is straightforward: to offer good quality whips that are a pleasure to own and use, at a fair price for the work and materials involved; and delivered within a reasonable time scale. I enjoy making whips, and it gives me great satisfaction to know the pleasure that they bring to others. 

My Background

To some degree, leather working has been in my family for at least three generations. In the 1940's, my grandfather made and repaired shoes for local people from the workshop at the back of his house in Redhill. My father would be sent to market to buy leather from the local merchant, with the admonition, "and tell 'im, no ox". I can remember shoe maker's tools in Dad's shed when I was a child but it never occurred to me to ask what they were doing there. Other than seeing him repair the occasional item of leather, I had no inkling that leather working was among the many accomplishments of my family until I spoke to him about setting up as a whip maker - and discovered that he even had some knowledge of plaiting leather

Like many of the current generation of whip makers, I came to the craft through whip cracking. I got hooked by having a go with cheap novelty whips. Five or ten minutes' use was enough for them to fall apart but, having been around lines and ropes since my youth, I was able make rough repairs easily enough. That sowed the seed of my interest in whip making. At that stage I had no inkling that there still people out there making quality whips the old fashioned way. My first ventures into whip making were made using nylon and cotton rope, and were a far cry from the sort of stuff that I'm making today.

Although I had no opportunity to learn my craft from another maker, over the next few years I had a unique chance to study the work of many of the world's better whip makers. Through my partner's business, I came into contact with American whip maker, Victor Tella. Victor's work, and subsequently that of other makers, opened my eyes to the possibilities that were available to someone with the right skills, patience and imagination. Hundreds of whips passed through our hands: new ones from well known modern makers and antiques by famous names such as Zair and R.M. Williams. At the same time, contact with the slowly growing community of British whip crackers (from both sides of the fetish fence) gave me the opportunity to become familiar with the work of many more whip makers; and offering a repairs service gave me an insight into the many ways that different whip makers go about making their products.

Those years informed my opinions on what I consider to be a good whip, and on how to go about making it: I saw some excellent whips, I saw poor whips that looked good, I saw poor looking whips that handled superbly, and I saw plenty of good whips that I just didn't like. 

Business Ethic

During the same period, I also heard a lot of rubbish spoken about whip making and whip makers - usually by whip makers or vendors trying to make a sale or giving out misinformation about a competitor's work. I made a promise to myself, that personal integrity and product quality would be central to how I do business.

Integrity

• I'll never give bad advice, or offer a whip that I don't think suits a customer's needs, in order to make a sale. 

• I'll happily direct a customer to another whip maker if I believe that they are more likely to be able to meet that customer's needs.

• I will never make negative comments - let alone misleading statements - about the quality of another whip maker's work, or the way they make their whips.

• My Terms and Conditions, Guarantee, and Returns Policy, are clearly stated on the website so that you know exactly where you stand before you place an order.

• I aim to run my business in an environmentally responsible manner: recycling packaging, cutting down on the use of petrochemicals in packaging and manufacturing materials, and trying to avoid the use of adhesives and solvents which may be harmful to the environment. I am currently (October 2006) looking at shipping options in order to reduce the carbon output associated with receiving raw materials and sending out deliveries.

Product Quality

• Every whip is made by solely by me, from start to finish.

• Performance first, aesthetics second: the whips I make are beautiful items because I try to get as close as possible to the principle that 'form follows function'.  They are built to be easy to crack and well behaved, with a long life expectancy. Consequently, the lace in the upper parts of thongs, and on handles, tends to be wider than some other whip makers' work and strands are usually dropped relatively late. Fancy braiding on handles and flexible parts of whips can affect longevity and handling, so I only vary the pattern when it will add to the performance of the whip or cannot adversely affect it.

• For longer whips, especially, I use hides that are slightly thicker than those used by some other whip makers. This makes for a whip that is better suited to use in our wet and muddy British climate, without unduly affecting the aesthetic or performance of the finished product.

• The vast majority of the leather I use for plaiting is supplied to me by a tannery that specialises in producing leather for whip making. It is noticeably superior to vegetable tanned craft and falconry leather in a number of ways. This leather is more expensive than ordinary vegetable tanned kangaroo hide, but the results are worth it.

• I don't take short cuts: all the lace for my whips is cut by hand, the traditional way, using a knife rather than a lace cutter or jig. This is slower but, I believe, it gives a greater feeling for the leather you are cutting, with the result that fewer strands break during plaiting and a better whip results. Once cut, the lace for the whip goes through three more stages of preparation before being ready for plaiting.

• Every layer of the whip is reinforced.

• Every whip comes with a 12 month guarantee.

• I will never send out a whip that I would not be happy to use myself.

Whip Making Materials

Kangaroo Hide

Since European craftsmen first settled in Australia, whip makers have recognised the advantages of this leather over others for the production of whips. The hides are thin but dense, cut cleanly, and are usually strong enough to be cut into very thin lace but still endure a strong pull - thus providing the whip maker with a number of functional and aesthetic advantages in comparison to other leathers.

There, of course, different tannages - and degrees of quality within those tannages. For some time, I used vegetable tanned craft hides. I still use such leather on occasion, for example when a custom commission requires a specific unusual colour but, for the very best whips, I prefer not to: even the finest vegetable tanned craft leathers have only about 75% of the strength of the leather I now import. Not only that, but I found that such leathers - not being produced with professional whip makers in mind - tend to have more scarring, tick marks and consequent waste. The leather I now import is the best that I have seen from any source and is a real pleasure to work with. It is, of course, imported with all relevant permits.

Roo hide is used throughout the whip: cores, shot sack and bolsters as well as plaited bellies and overlays. I do not use any other leathers in any part of any whip that is sold as a kangaroo hide whip (except the fall).

Cow Hide

There is a myth that the only good whip is a kangaroo hide one. Whilst it's true that a good whip maker can refine and tweak his or her designs more easily with kangaroo, the bottom line is that it's the way in which the whip is put together that has the greatest influence on it's quality. 

All that said, for the time being, I have reluctantly halted production of cowhide whips. I have been finding it increasingly difficult to source really good hide in the UK, with the result that I find myself spending as much time making a cowhide whip as I do on a more complicated (and higher priced) roo hide design. In addition, because I won't use lower quality leather, a lot is going to waste. 

Australian cowhide stock whips will remain available - and they make great first whips for a whip cracker on a budget, or who wants the toughest whip possible.

Other Materials

I believe that everyone has a responsibility to limit their impact upon the world around them, and that increasing the use of natural products has an important part to play in safeguarding the future. Because of this, I try to minimise the impact of my craft on the environment: my ideal is a whip that caused no harm in the making, and will completely rot away when it's finally discarded. I have not quite got there but the steel handles are recyclable, any lead can be removed for recycling or responsible disposal, and virtually all other materials will rot away safely - or could even be composted! 

• I don't use GRP for whipstocks, or make nylon whips; and the only synthetic threads you'll find in my whips are the crackers (and even that may not be true for too much longer).

• There are no petrochemical-based dressings used in making the whip - my own-recipe braiding soap is made with natural soaps, waxes and fats.

• I am one of a dwindling number of whip makers world-wide, who still use natural materials for whip cord, and for reinforcement. This can make for a slightly thicker than normal transition on bullwhip thongs, but has no impact on durability or strength of the finished product.

• I use very little in the way of adhesives: the strength of my whips comes from old-fashioned construction methods. When I do use them, I use rubber based adhesives that have no harmful solvents.

• I try to minimise the use of lead, so I won't make bull and stock whips (other than my mini-bulls) with shot sacks. On the occasions when I do use lead, I break my rule about no petrochemicals to seal it under plastic tape in order to prevent any chance of  part of it leaching through the leather over time. When the whip is ultimately discarded, lead shot can be recovered from the shot sack or handle to enable re-cycling of the metal parts and disposal of the natural parts of the whip.

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