Makeover of my Makeover sporran

[OC Richard]

On an earlier post I showed my makeover of a reproduction London Scottish officers/pipe majors sporran.

While that makeover was fine, I thought the cantle called for a more Culloden-style look.

Seeing as I wanted a red liner to make the red heart cutouts in the cantle look nice, I went with matching red for the tassels.

I did the Culloden style tassels, a long middle one and short ones on each side.

As usual I did some weathering on the cords and tassels, as I had already done on the cantle.

Here's the result:

[Troglodyte]

The red gives a good contrast...

If you could come up with a detachable tassel cord system, a set of different colour options might be possible - like you get watches with different coloured straps to swap and change as the fancy takes you.

[OC Richard]

The style below does have that ability.

Since the strips of leather that support the tassels are attached to the liner/gasket and not to the sporran body, you could have a number of different interchangeable liner-tassels assemblies (different colours, various numbers and arrangements of tassels, etc.)

Actually that's what I was setting out to do: make a bright red liner/gasket to bring out the heart cutouts, with matching red strips and tassels.

But then I started looking at vintage sporrans with "Culloden" style cantles and many had the three-tassel arrangement, one long centre one with two short ones on the sides.

I do have a sporran with the cantle seen top left, which has the X-strips tassel arrangement. My plan is to someday more or less replicate that sporran.

[OC Richard]

Comparing Makeover 1 to Makeover 2.

I'm much happier with the new one (right).

BTW I had two church pipings gigs yesterday and wore the new sporran to both.

[Father Bill]

Comparing Makeover 1 to Makeover 2.

I'm much happier with the new one (right).

BTW I had two church pipings gigs yesterday and wore the new sporran to both.

The red really is striking, Richard. How 'usual' or 'frequent' is that, or has it been through the years? (Notice how I'm skirting the word 'traditional'.)

[grizzbass]

they are very attractive sporrans

[OC Richard]

The red really is striking, Richard. How 'usual' or 'frequent' is that, or has it been through the years? (Notice how I'm skirting the word 'traditional'.)

Yes the red is really nice, adds a lot to the whole outfit. (The little matchy-matchy devil on one shoulder is whispering in my ear that I should get garter flashes in that exact red.)

That really cool period of sporran development around the late 19th and early 20th centuries had white leather sporrans with red tassels sometimes, here's one, and also a seal sporran with red tassels and liner making the heart cutouts pop out nicely.

These were my inspiration.

[OC Richard]

The red really is striking, Richard. How 'usual' or 'frequent' is that, or has it been through the years? (Notice how I'm skirting the word 'traditional'.)

Father Bill I thought of this question last week when I was at the National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh examining the 1700 full-length oil portrait Lord Duffus.

His sporran seems to be natural deerskin but with red flap trim, cords, and tassels.

The red cords & tassels with metal balls is very similar to what I did on my sporran, though I don't think before last week I realised that this sporran from 1700 was like that.

[Jock Scot]

To my eye, the red needs toning down a bit, well actually, a lot. Sorry.

[OC Richard]

To my eye, the red needs toning down a bit, well actually, a lot. Sorry.

Oh don't be sorry!

Actually I did tone down the red somewhat. You should have seen how it originally looked!

And I might tone it down a bit more. I let things settle a while, because things that aren't apparent at first can become obvious a month or two later.

I've got a new sporran project in the works which will have darker more claret/burgundy leather. I've ordered the leather, I won't know the exact colour till it arrives.