Manifesto
"Skin celebrates the interconnected relationship between fauna, tradition, music, and humanity through the art of leather making. A deep dive into the leather industry led us to uncover an overlap of craft appreciation and a unique cultural expression—woven into industry, womanhood, musical expression and design."
Leather is one of the most ancient crafts to ever exist.
It represents an age-old survival gesture of taking advantage of our resources as hunters and gatherers turning skins and hides into shelter, protection and safety.
Leather making and the tanning process has to be one of the most ingenious, both rudimental and technological ways of transforming a raw material, keeping some invaluable characteristics such as flexibility, elasticity and durability. In fact, it goes beyond durability, the way it ages to become something better than its first version.
Leather is a by-product of the meat industry.
The leather industry has been hiding behind this statement which, while truthful in the majority of the cases, narrows the narrative surrounding the industry into a waste-free, ecological and sustainable industry. This is unfortunately untrue in the majority of circumstances. There are many ways in which leather can be sustainable: from the agriculture conditions the livestock is raised, handled and slaughtered; in the usage of local hides in the tanning process; to the integral usage of the cattle’s parts to various industries; to the way hides are tanned - the tanning process can be very energy efficient and overall clean, tannins can be vegetable and locally sourced; to the way leather is finished with non-polluting coats so its circular and biodegradable. Sustainability also encompases fair pay in all stages of production and overall sane and safe work conditions. More on leather sustainability in our interview with Alice V. Robinson.
Our relationship with leather and culture
Leather became a material so familiar and close to us, yet, we maintain a strange relationship to its production.
Historically, our uses of leather spanned from capes and clothing, to shoes, storage accessories and handles, equestrian accessories, boats, bags, furniture and design, teepees, stationary and book binding, musical instruments. The list goes on and on.
Through the many facets on how we transformed leather to fit our daily needs, it became a core expression of identity and culture. There are many associations we make when we think of the word leather and many cultures around the world have specialized in different expressions.
As designers invested in culture and the sense of locality, when we first approached leather it was natural for us to research what is the relationship between Leather and Portugal. We were not ready for such a vast venture. Portugal was once one of the most important leather producers in Europe, exporting very unique technologies in the shoe making industry, more specifically in sole making.
We were also drawn to other uses of leather that were not the obvious ones to us such as book binding and musical instruments. We got fascinated by the way leather permeates all senses: touch, vision, smell and sound.
It was when we started mapping the senses we found Adufe. An instrument that became the centre of our research for encompassing many of the issues we wanted to communicate.
Adufe is a Portuguese frame-drum instrument played almost exclusively by women in various parts of the country, accompanied by hymns of praise to love, to the land and to work in the fields.