The Taylor family of Victoria’s SKT Leather preparing for business to turn 30
This family leather goods business started out as a way to supplement the farm income. These days they work on everything from whips and saddles to rocking horses.
WHENEVER the weather turns cold or wet, Sharron Taylor happily swaps farm duties for sitting in the SKT Leather workshop.
“Everybody just loves the workshop,” says Sharron, whose initials form the business name.
“They come in and they just breathe deeply and say ‘ohh, smell the leather’.”
The workshop sits on the Taylor farm at Boralma, near Wangaratta, where Sharron, George and their youngest daughter, Sarah, 26, breed Charolais cattle.
While SKT Leather will celebrate its 30th anniversary in November, having a designated workshop is relatively new for the family. Before moving to this property about seven years ago, Sharron and George would make use of whatever space they had to store their leather and to work.
But now, they have converted a double-garage into a workshop, from where they make belts, hat bands, whips, saddles and other products, and also do restorations.
SKT Leather, which was born when the Taylors lived at Baranduda, started as a way for Sharron to supplement their farm income while working at home and looking after two young daughters.
“I’d been always making and repairing horse gear and things like that. I can remember repairing my sister’s saddle when I think I was about 14. That was the first one of those I did,” she says.
“And I made a few bridles and halters and things like that when I was a kid.
“At the time I started it, he (George) was working off-farm and he didn’t take long to get roped into it. It got a little bit bigger and I got a bit busier and so I roped him in on weekends and things like that, whenever he could, and then it just got too big for that. Apart from the farm we did that full-time as well.”
When she started out, Sharron says she was mainly plaiting whips and hatbands, as well as doing saddlery repairs.
Then in the late 1990s, thanks to the launch of their website and word-of-mouth, Sharron says they soon found themselves sending “whips and things all over the world”. A belt has been sent as far away as Iceland, while Sharron also had to send some smaller items to a US soldier in the Middle East.
“Then we started making a little bit of custom-made things that are definitely one-off. Things like log book covers, chef knife rolls, all sorts of different designed saddlery items for horses,” she says, adding that SKT Leather is one of only a handful of businesses approved by the Australian Stock Horse Society to use its “A” logo on their products.
The Taylors work with kangaroo and cow hides. The saddlery leather comes from Walsall in England, but they also source leather locally.
Their latigo cowhide whip, which can vary from 1.2m to 2.1m in length, are the main whip product, but Sharron says they also customise kangaroo-hide whips for gifts or special presentations.
“I really love making whips out of the kangaroo hide. It is just such a lovely medium to work with,” she says.
“The belts we tend to make from Eastern Grey kangaroo because they’ve got a little bit of a thicker hide and they get a bit more weight in the belt, whereas the whips we use Red kangaroo for those because it’s a much finer leather and it is the most superb medium to use in the world.”
When it comes to restorations, Sharron says they have worked on everything from old saddles and whips, to items for the local RSL such as packhorse saddles.
One recent project was the restoration of an old rocking horse the customer had used as a child and now wanted to give to his granddaughter. Clothes moths had attacked the hide covering, so it was given a new hide exterior, mane, and saddle and stirrups.
“The restorations, it’s like restoring an old house sometimes — until you get into it you really don’t know what it’s like or how bad the damage is. “Often times the leather is quite old and brittle, which really makes it difficult to work with. You’ve got to be very, very careful with it.
“There are pros and cons for it, but it really is lovely to hear those stories and to see the joy on people’s faces when they come to pick things up.”
The Taylors farm 130ha and lease a further 161ha at Boralma. George and Sarah are second- and third-generation Charolais breeders, respectively, and run about 300 cattle.
Sharron says she and George, who will have been married 37 years next month and have both endured cancer battles the past few years, were “quite chuffed” when Sarah decided to come home from Melbourne to join the family businesses.
And their eldest daughter, Erin, who lives in the Riverina, has also launched her own handmade leather jewellery business, Bluebell Leather Designs.
Sharron says it has been a quiet year this year, as many events they would normally attend, such as the Mountain Cattlemen’s Get Together, The Man from Snowy River festival and various stockhorse shows, have been cancelled because of the bushfire and coronavirus threats.
“Our program has been curtailed a little bit this year so we are just working from home,” Sharron says.
“We are trying to dream up something nice for our 30th anniversary in November. We might make a special release 30th anniversary whip.”
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