Episode 006: Buckskin Tanning

Have you ever watched a movie about mountain men or trappers, and thought “man, those guys have the coolest clothes.”  Well, you’re absolutely right.  The clothing that they’re wearing is called “buckskins” or “buckskin suits.”  It’s made from, you guessed it… buckskin. 

What makes buckskin different from leather?  I thought you’d never ask; we cover all of that in this episode of the podcast. 

Buckskin does way more than just make those tough old mountain men look super cool, it’s also probably the most durable and most comfortable material that you could ever use to make any sort of clothing.  We go into some of the other benefits in the episode, so tune in and give it a listen. 

Of course, we’re not just going to talk about buckskin.  We’re going to get our hands dirty and actually make some buckskin using traditional tanning methods in this episode. 

We do cover the basics that you need to understand when it comes to skin anatomy and chemistry in order to do this on your own, but I know you don’t want to have to take notes while you’re listening to this episode of the podcast.  When you’re ready to try tanning your own buckskin, here’s the book that I recommended in the podcast:

“Deerskins into Buckskins” by Matt Richards.