Mia Sabel leather designer, saddle maker and recipient of a QEST Scholarship.

Following a successful 25-year career in brand design and theatre, Mia Sabel embarked upon a new career, practising authentic leather craft skills within the tradition of English saddlery.

Mia Sabel has studied saddlery as well as associated skills such as traditional upholstery, leather restoration, framed bag-making, case-making, leather technology and leather sewing-machine skills and she is currently studying harness-making. She uses these specialised and traditional skills to create equine products and luxury leather goods for humans, pets and homes.

Using traditional and custom-made tools, Mia Sabel uses the high standards required of saddlery in all of her leather goods: hand-cutting, hand-stitching using hand-waxed linen thread which Mia can make herself and hand-burnishing leather edges using a cow bone and elbow grease. Mia sources her materials from the UK wherever possible and uses only the best quality, which includes Sedgwick Bridle Leather and English brass fittings.

Mia Sabel’s many products fall into three sections: Horse, Human and Home. Saddlery items include saddles, girths and stirrup leathers, bridles, training aids and head collars. Her range of modular stationery (organisers, desk pads, artist pads, fold-over pads) has standard hole-punch holes and can use recycled paper. In a thoughtful fusion of the old and the new, Mia offers downloadable diary pages on her website, enabling customers to fill her diary organiser using their own paper and printer. Bespoke bags are made to customer requirements and made-to-measure and bespoke watch straps are available in a wide range of leather and thread colours. All of her belts, whether casual or dress, are hand-stitched and polished using bridle leather.

Most of Mia’s products can be personalised with initials and names and a decorative ‘typographic stamping effect’ can also be achieved by stamping a name randomly over the leather, with each letter stamped individually. Hand-stitching in traditional waxed linen thread in a variety of colours is also offered.

Mia Sabel’s range even extends to Leather Love Saddle Soap, her own recipe for ‘leather food’ designed to protect new leather goods or restore old and much-loved items. Sold alongside her leather MOT and restoration services, it is evidence of Mia’s genuine love and respect for leather as an artist’s material.

You can see a slection of Mia Sabels’s works at her official website: http://sabelsaddlery.co.uk