Gary Billingham, factory manager at Ettinger, a family-owned luxury leather goods maker based in Walsall. Photograph: Christopher Thomond\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
About 20 people, mostly women, work carefully and precisely in Ettinger\u2019s factory \u2013 a site of leather goods production since the 1890s \u2013 with a handful more doing work from home.<\/p>\n
Robert Ettinger, the company\u2019s chief executive, says the vast majority of its manufacturing process has to be done by hand. \u201cYou can\u2019t bring in robots.\u201d<\/p>\n
He still owns the British brand founded in 1934 by his father, who turned to selling and manufacturing leather goods in the UK after fleeing Nazi Germany via Paris and a stint in the film industry.<\/p>\n
Ettinger began making wallets and sourcing leather items, and today the company supplies a range of luxury goods to wealthy customers, including King Charles and Queen Camilla whose royal warrants they hold.<\/p>\n
The company\u2019s bestseller is still a wallet, but they also sell leather pill containers, cigar cases, picture frames and various accoutrements for dog owners, from treat cases to dog-waste bag holders, all of which can be personalised with initials.<\/p>\n
Robert Ettinger, son of the leatherware maker\u2019s founder, in the Ettinger showroom in London. Photograph: Sean Smith\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
The brand sits in a niche between the big label luxury and high street with a British hand-crafted leather tote bag for just under \u00a3800 compared with more than \u00a32,000 charged by a big swinger such as Louis Vuitton.<\/p>\n
An array of machines resembling pastry-cutters are used to punch out leather shapes that are then glued by hand with a brush to build up each item with trims and linings.<\/p>\n
The tiny seams around the leather edges are thinned down with a shaving machine, known as a skiver, and turned inward before being stitched with a sewing machine. Each piece is then carefully checked and trimmed using a scalpel and sharp scissors before being polished and wrapped in tissue paper.<\/p>\n
All manner of leather goods are made at Ettinger, from pill containers to cigar cases, bags and various accoutrements for dog owners. Photograph: Christopher Thomond\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
Gerry Ettinger, the founder, began by using an array of manufacturers before buying his original factory at the heart of London\u2019s leather-working trade in Clerkenwell near the Smithfield meat market in the 1950s.<\/p>\n
Robert Ettinger says: \u201cWhen I was a kid, there were dozens and dozens of small factories, making leather goods, and they all specialised. One made suitcases, and one made handbags, and one made wallets.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the area gentrified in the 1990s, the Ettingers decided to move and bought out one of their suppliers, James Homer in Walsall, established in 1890. It was then mostly making corporate promotional leather goods. Staff were trained up and new machinery brought in to make the high standard of goods expected by Ettinger\u2019s new international clientele led by the Japanese.<\/p>\n
Walsall has been a centre of leather-working from the middle ages. It was focused on saddle-making with more than 100 firms operating in the town by the end of the 19th century.<\/p>\n
As the use of horses in everyday life declined, the factories began expanding into making other leather goods, ranging from bicycle saddles, car upholstery and furnishings to bags, gloves and purses.<\/p>\n
The industry thrived during the first world war when there was high demand for military saddle wear but began to suffer in the 1950s as it faced competition from abroad and from human-made alternatives to leather.<\/p>\n
Still, by 1970 there were about 50 leather goods manufacturers in Walsall, and the town produced around half of the British-made fancy leather goods, according to the Wolverhampton Heritage and History Society.<\/p>\n
Products for dog lovers, such as keyrings, are popular. Photograph: Christopher Thomond\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
Tracy, expertly glueing and building Ettinger\u2019s elaborate cigar cases before they are sewn, has been at the company for 15 years and working in the leather industry since she left school 40 years ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we were that age it was all leather work. You could walk out of one job and into another on the same day,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
That history is recognised in street names and the local Saddlers Centre shopping mall and there is a leather skills training centre which offers courses in bridle making.<\/p>\n
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