Thread: Choices.... Choices

Received a package yesterday from Alastair (Owner/Operator) of Westholme Strops and he sent me several of his strops to test:

From L to R are Roo, Spanish Horse Hide and Cordovan, Kanayama is far right and my other strops are under these.

The Roo has a very different feel and draw to me is a medium heavy, the Spanish Horse Hide is a light draw and the Cordovan which is his personal strop of several years is a light to glassy draw, he wanted to send me a Cordovan that was broken in so i could get an idea of the draw.

Even though both his Cordovan and Kanayama is Cordovan they both exibit a very different draw and feel.

Hiw would you describe them versus a kanayama?

Originally Posted by dinnermint

Hiw would you describe them versus a kanayama?

Westholme Cordovan has about 1/2 the draw that the Kanayama 70 has, the Roo is slightly heavier against the Kanayama and the Spanish Horsehide is slightly lighter, the linen back pieces are buttery smooth.

when youre done with your tests ill take them next please. =P

Originally Posted by Jnatcat

Westholme Cordovan has about 1/2 the draw that the Kanayama 70 has

I'm guessing this is because of the final "treatment" in the strop process.
Or possibly the area/breed the cordovan is sourced from

Interesting that you think it only has 1/2 the draw.

Originally Posted by sloanwinters

when youre done with your tests ill take them next please. =P

Sure just wait by the door, seriously it ws very nice of Alastair to send my way for testing. We had discussed for several, several weeks about his different offering so he said rather than try to guess which one I would like he sent all three.

His definition of draw is quite different than mine as in he puts his cordonvan with the least and the Italian HH in the middle and Roo with the least but I find the Roo to be have a very heavy draw compared to the Italian HH and the cordovan is light to glassy but it's quite different compared to my Kanayama cordovan.

Here is his definition of Kanayama:

Kanayama cordovan is not 'Shell' Cordovan, of the type I use (made by Horween). They are quite a different material. The Kanayama maker uses his own proprietary methods of treating the leather, and the surface is quite different to Horween Shell Cordovan. As I have previously mentioned, Shell Cordovan starts out with next to no draw, but develops a 'magnetic' or 'creamy' feel after 2 or 3 months of use. This can be felt as a 'draw' by some, but its just a very unique feeling - and I would still class Shell Cordovan as a lighter draw - even after the magnetic feeling develops.

What a guy!

I have been eyeing his strops up for sometime now but haven't yet taken the plunge. I did contact him last year but he had pneumonia and so couldn't do anything for a few months and then had a large backlog. In the meantime I picked up a Michael Waterhouse strop. I might be back on the case for one of these now. He offers a great range of choices.

Enablers everywhere! I am currently awaiting a response from Alastair to begin the process of design and construction (and transfer of funds). I have eyed his work for a while and finally can no longer resist.

Just a quick update, so far I have been using the Roo solely for a week and the maker advised that it's draw is supposed to be quite a lot lighter than his Spanish HH that will be tested in about another week or so, the Roo to me has a much heavier draw compared to the Spanish HH so I thought I had them mixed up and conversed with the maker and he advised that draw is very subjective and he also backs both his Roo and Spanish HH with an identical piece of HH that is the same thickness as the stropping surface and possibly will affect draw, I have also noticed that the Roo is somewhat of a rougher surface compared to the Spanish one and by no means liks sandpaper just not as smooth of a surface to strop on that I am used to with my other strops like Kanayama, Tony Miller and Scrupleworks, i will admit that I have a heavy stropping hand and personally don't believe in that whole weight of blade stropping pressure thing so for me I get better results pushing downward some to the point that the leather curls around the spine slightly but not enough to roll the edge and I keep the strop pretty taunt, my method os very similar to Lynn A. method here so I am confident that my stropping is acceptable and am thinking that the Roo might possibly not be my choice but to give it a fair shake i am going to reduce my pressure for the next week and see if the draw gets lighter and will report back with an update.

https://youtu.be/

Really interested in this. I am currently discussing a couple of strops with the gentleman, one being Roo.