Classic Leather Fobs came into being a few years ago as a result of Richard’s attempts to find a top quality keyring for his own classic car.
He remembered good quality keyrings being available years ago with lovely vitreous enamel badges mounted onto good quality leather keyfobs. None of these seemed to be available any more.
So – being a craftsman who had always worked with natural materials - he set about making his own keyring.
Others who saw the result also wanted one – and a business came into being which now sends keyrings to customers all over the globe.
Richard works on his own in a leather workshop in a small village in the Lincolnshire Wolds on the East Coast of England. There will have been a saddlery here in this village for over a thousand years making important leather goods for working men and working horses. Now all that is made here are keyrings.
The keyrings produced are of the very highest quality and are greatly appreciated by those who remember the standards of workmanship which prevailed many years ago before techniques of mass production took over the world.
The vitreous enamel badges are made here in England – just as they always were. The leather keyfob which the badge is attached to is individually hand made from the best saddlery hide and stitched by hand with linen thread.
These keyrings are not just something to hang on a nail with a car key attached.
They can become a trusted talisman which travels everywhere with it’s owner on his or her journeys through life - and there can now be very few roads in this world which one of these keyrings has not travelled along.
Restoration and repair of customer’s keyrings.
Keyrings which customers have owned and used for many years can eventually need repair and making & fitting new leather fobs to these is all part of the business.
Original old stock keyrings sometimes for sale
Original old stock keyrings are available from the online shop as and when we can find them.
This is the road across the High Wold which leads to the workshop.
Kings and Queens passed along here in former days when Lincolnshire was an important place.
Leading down the hill towards the workshop which is just at the hill foot.
King Henry IV of England ( son of John of Gaunt ) was born at The Castle here in 1367.
Oliver Cromwell and his Parliamentarian troops came down this hill in 1643 during the English Civil War to lay siege to The Castle which was garrisoned by Royalist forces.
On 11th October 1643 Cromwell and his troops ascended the hill in the background and met with Royalist reinforcements at Winceby Field just over the brow of the hill.
The ensuing Battle of Winceby resulted in the deaths of over 750 Royalist troops and Cromwell won the day despite famously having his own horse shot from beneath him.
East Kirkby Heritage Centre is now visited by many thousands of visitors from all over Europe and the rest of the world each year. It serves as a place of remembrance for aircrew of all nations who sacrificed their lives during those dark days of World War II. Photograph by kind permission of Lee Ballard www.anwickphotography.co.uk
Just over a mile away from the workshop is East Kirkby Airfield which was home to 57 Squadron and 630 Squadron ( Bomber Command ) during World War II.
212 operations were flown from this airfield resulting in the loss of 121 Lancaster bombers together with the lives of over a thousand young men.