better than average

Just what my son needed to get started on leather craft.

Tools look ok enough. Haven't tried them yet. Would have been good if it was packed with blades facing in not out. Got decently cut and it cut the side of the tool folder.

This kit has every thing you could possibly need. The tools for punching leather could come with a sharpener. I have made several leather journals wrap style. I have not use on Hard leather. I think once you have you have for life. Everything is good quality and nothing was missing got everything as advertised. They thought of everything! This is part of my art making tool kit! Great Price for what you get.

Hood starter kit. Tools alittle too cheap

I bought this kit last year and used it to make a full set of leather armor. It works great for the price, and I still use a lot of the tools from it.I'd recommend to get this kit if you are just starting leatherwork and have no clue on what tools you will use the most (like me). This kit provides pretty much everything you need to start, and once you figure out what tools you use the most, you can then go and buy the higher quality ones. It will save you on spending a ton of money on higher quality tools that you don't end up using!That being said, while I did go buy some higher end tools, and additional tools after using this kit, I do still use a lot of the tools in this kit as well. Tools I still use: mallet, hole punches, stitching hole punches, burnishing wood, awl, cutting mat, edge beveler/groover, rivet kit, leather cutting knife, sewing tracing wheel, swivel knife (this one is super sharp!), x-acto knife, stamps, sewing needles and wax thread--so, a lot! The only tool that I absolutely needed to upgrade was the metal leather skiver, which was a little too lightweight.For those reviews saying the tools aren't sharp enough--that's normal, and these tools can be sharpened! While higher end tools will come razor sharp right out of the box, you will still have to sharpen them after using them. Leatherwork dulls tools pretty quickly, so you will have to figure out how to sharpen your tools either way whether they are high end or not! Get yourself a double sided strop (or just use a piece of scrap leather) and some leather strop polishing compound and you'll be good to go! They also sell leather hole punch grinders to sharpen the hole punches.The case that holds all the tools isn't the highest quality, but I still use it and have even been able to fit additional tools in there.All in all, this is a great set for the money that will get you started until you inevitably fall in love with leatherwork and just have to expand your collection of tools as you go!

This is an amazing leather kit for the price you pay! Huge variety of tool, they are sharp for smooth cutting of leather. The tools have multiple functions and and verity of colors. This is an amazing beginners kit that I highly recommend buying!

I am having so much fun with this. It is HUGE. and I love the cutting board. I used the letter stamps to make keychains for my family this year. I cannot wait until I get in more leather to see what else I can do.

Most of the reviews for this leatherworking kit are useless. I'm glad you gave it to your boyfriend and he says he loves it, but that doesn't tell me if the tools are any good. I suspect a "starter package" inherently won't attract many reviews by people with extensive leatherworking experience, but it still annoys me.In hopes of bucking the trend, I'm going to at least comment briefly about each tool individually. I don't have extensive leatherworking experience (hence why I bought this starter kit), but I do know a thing or two about tools - and I actually used the kit before reviewing it.While I am going to point out many "flaws" with this kit, I still think it's a fairly good starter package - i.e. just because I can find small issues doesn't mean this is a bad product. Even expensive tools might need final adjustments or sharpening before use, most of the items in this kit are no different. I hope prospective buyers can use that information to decide how well this kit will work for them.One thing I should mention right off the bat is that I found many of the tools to be too dull for immediate use. Sharpening doesn't need to be an expensive or difficult chore, but if you don't know how and aren't willing to learn... you're going to have a suboptimal experience with these tools (and maybe leatherworking in general). You might want to look for tools that use replaceable blades if sharpening isn't a task you want to undertake.I sharpened the stitch groover, the swivel knife, the skiving knife and several hole and stitching punches before I even tried them on leather. It was obvious that was going to be necessary for best results. However, I'm picky about having sharp tools and have plenty of sharpening gear on hand.I think you could get away with a heavy stropping rather than a full sharpening for most tools, just to refine the edge slightly, but that would leave some pretty heavy striations.Let's talk about the kit selection. Does this have EVERYTHING you need to start leatherworking? Yes, kind of - you can make stuff with this kit by just adding leather, but there are some "basic" items people may want to add:a lighter to melt the ends of your thread,a cork-backed ruler, andperhaps a poundo board, if you want to make use of the punches.Then there are a bunch of things that are more fairly categorized as "supplies", but may be required as immediate purchases before you start:glue,finish,dye,wool daubers,beeswax, andmetal polish (for stropping your cutting tools with a piece of scrap leather).There's other tools that are nice-to-have, but you will probably decide to add if you like the hobby - e.g. a stitching horse or a hand-held hole punch with various sizes.As for what comes in this kit, I might as well start with the case itself. It's fairly standard, holds everything well and seems reasonably durable. I don't think it would hold up to regular daily use and it doesn't have much spare room for extras you'll want to add later - but it is nice to have a light duty case and organizer included.The mallet is the jewel of the kit! Seems well made, looks good and has enough heft to be useful. Lots of cheap kits have light duty mallets that will make punching a chore. I have no complaints about this mallet.The number and letter punch set seems like a filler item to get the piece-count higher to me, but maybe you'll find them useful. I haven't tried these yet. They look fine, maybe a bit light duty - but that's a visual and heft assessment only since these aren't something I expect to use.The curved skiving knife is nothing exciting, but not bad either. Just some folded metal. seems to work well enough.The circular cutting knife works well. I don't think it's a heavy duty unit either, but it cut just fine for me.Nailboards worked great to true up the edges of my pieces.Edge Burnisher - you could burnish edges with a chopstick in a pinch, so it's not like this is a highly technical tool. It's well finished. I have trouble holding it to use the smaller grooves (I wish it were an inch or so longer), but that might just be my hand size.Needles - perfectly usable, no complaints. It only comes with straight needles, so some people might want to buy some curved ones too.I don't like the ruler. A cork-backed metal ruler would be much safer. Metal rulers slide easy on leather and are a recipe for finger cuts. This is a small complaint however - what's a ruler going to set you back - another $5 maybe? It would be nice if the kit came with a cork-backed one.The flat skiving knife seems reasonable. It actually had a decent, albeit coarse edge on it. No idea what grade of steel it is made from, so I expect frequent sharpening is in order - but it took a nice edge.The caliper things... I don't know what they are exactly (apologies for my lack of leatherworking knowledge). I assumed they were intended to crease the leather so your stitch line would sit lower (making your stitching last longer because it doesn't sit proud and rub against everything). They have too much freeplay to serve this function reliably - especially since you have to push fairly hard to get a good line. If I'm using this tool wrong then I take it all back - but I don't think it works.The stitch groover on the other hand, worked fine. This tool cuts a trench in the leather for your stitch to sit in. Well, it didn't work hardly at all right out of the package, but if you use it to cut a trench in a scrap piece of leather, you can rub metal polish in the trench and then push it backwards through the trench to strop it. After I did that it worked quite well. It would be nicer if the locking ring for the guide piece had finer threads, but it works nevertheless. Good tool overall.The kit comes with two awls: one sharp, the other slightly blunted. They seem light duty to me, but they work fine. I might just swap one or both out for something better from my shop. I figure most people will just use these and then upgrade later as they do more leatherwork. The sharp awl is better for tracing templates or piercing a hole. The dull awl is helpful to line up holes.The hole punch seems very cheesy. Like something you might pick up for a couple bucks at an office supply store. The kit comes with leather hole punches you hit with the mallet, so I'm not sure you're meant to use the hand punch for that - maybe it's for use with your paper templates? The opening is only wide enough for very lightweight leather anyway. I didn't even try it.The punches work! There are some noticeable burrs left over from manufacturing on the hole punches, but they still made clean holes. Repeated use might clean out the burrs over time, but it might be a good idea to do it manually to keep burrs from rolling the edge over and dulling the punches.Scissors are good enough to cut paper. That's probably all they are intended for anyway. Just note that they aren't "shears" and are too loose to cut thread cleanly. It's nice to have a pair in the kit so you don't have to supply your own, but they're probably something to consider upgrading later (or right away).The stitching wheel tools - they probably have a proper name, but I'm not sure what it is. The one comes with alternate wheels with different spacing. It works well and the extra wheels are a nice addition. The really spiky one was very wobbly, I think I could probably squeeze the prongs together, but as-is it seems like it would make a very sloppy stitch line.The kit comes with a self-healing cutting mat too, which is nice. It's in a pouch on the backside of the case - easy to overlook. I thought I was missing it at first.The snap/rivet "kit" works, but the snaps don't seem to have enough retention to me. You don't get all that many of each color in the kit either. Nevertheless, they work - I tried them all out on leather and the rivet setter and punches are good enough to continue using if you buy more supplies.Other than that there are various small pieces like thread, leather finger thimbles, some metal finger thimble-things, allen keys and screwdrivers for adjusting the tools. None of those stood out as especially high-quality to me, but they seem serviceable.One of the nice things about a kit like this is that it has all the stuff - no need to go hunting for something while you're working. I suspect most of the items will be swapped out by someone who keeps going with leathercraft, but it would cost a lot more to start out with high-grade gear before you know if you like it or not.I'm of two minds when it comes to tool kits like this - sometimes I say it's better to "buy once, cry once", other times I say just get the cheap stuff and upgrade only what you wear out because that means you're using it. Which best applies here is something you'll have to decide for yourself based on your budget and confidence that you're going to stick with leathercrafting. I'd say this kit gives you sufficient tools and they're good-enough quality that you can make pretty much whatever and have very good results. There's a number of things I wish were nicer, but I didn't want to spend 2x the money either.Provided you can sharpen the tools (or are willing to learn), I think this is a pretty good starter kit.

For years my husband has been saying he wanted to learn leatherworking. For Christmas, I got him this kit so he could dip his toe into the world of leather working.This is a good starter kit. The quality was surprisingly good. There is a large variety of stamps and items needed to make basic objects like checkbooks or bookmarks. Everything is sturdy and has its own place in the bag. There are other tools a person will need as well as good leather but having everything all in one place is nice.The stamps are well molded with no obvious flaws and produce a nice clean image on leather. The booklet that came with it, which is hidden in an outside pouch, is nice and a good starter for learning the tools.The only major flaw we could find was the mallet used to tap the stamps is forever coming unscrewed. Its a pain to deal with when you are getting in the rhythm of stamping a pattern and you have to stop to fix the mallet. Eventually, we glued the pieces together and that helps. It was still a frustrating flaw.Overall, we are very happy with the kit. He likes his new hobby and good tools only help. He would recommend this kit to anyone who is beginning to get into leatherworking.

Has everything you need stored neatly.

***Check the velcro pocket on the back if you can't find the manual or A4 cutting mat!!!***I thought my kit was missing the cutting mat and book detailing the pieces inside. Contacted the seller and figured I'd just order another mat from somewhere else since I didn't expect a response honestly. I was pleasantly surprised to find the seller was very responsive (within 24 hrs) and told me of the velcro pocket on the back of the case where my booklet and cutting mat were stored! Great customer service as that pocket really blends in and I had no idea it was there!This kit has a little bit of everything for anyone wanting to see if leatherworking is a hobby they'd enjoy! Good starter kit and pieces seem like they'll hold up for a while while my other half gets some practice in. I'm sure they'll eventually be replaced with higher end items, but the need isn't there for a good while.

Arrived before expected delivery time.Scissors aren’t good for leather.Hole punch is not functional, the handle bent on first use. Had to buy another.Everything is really good and I’m quite pleased.