Vintage RUSSIA REINDEER LEATHER 'bottle' shape keyring

This listing is to order a ‘ bottle’ shaped keyring in the Russia leather .

The main leather body of these keyrings measures approx 3.0″ ( 75mm ) x 1.5″ ( 40mm )

Bottle shaped keyrings made from 225 year old Russia Leather recovered from the wreck of the Danish Brigantine ‘Metta Catherina’ ( The story of The Russia Leather follows the description of the keyrings ) :-

We produce these keyrings using a specially selected grade of this incredible 225 year old leather.

We were very fortunate to have a friend in the sailing world at Burnham Overy Staithe in North Norfolk who had an item which had been produced using the Russia hide .

Through his sailing connections he knew Robin Snelson from Mylor near Falmouth who was a well known local leather worker who had received some of the hides when they were first recovered from the wreck . Through this friend we contacted Robin and he agreed to provide us with some of the leather to produce hand made keyrings from .

This leather is a very finite resource & we now have only just one hide left to work with .

The Russia leather which we use has been identified as Reindeer hide which does not have the substance ( thickness )  for us to make the standard of keyring which we are now very well know for – so we laminate the top layer of Russia hide with an additional layer of leather internally and then hand stitch the two thicknesses of leather together to produce these remarkable keyrings.

Much of the leather recovered from the wreck was bovine ( cow )  hide which was a much thicker and coarser material and not particularly attractive with a coarse grain  and unsuitable for making keyrings from .

The price of our keyrings seems a very small amount to pay for the amount of selection & workmanship which goes into each one of these little works of art – not to mention what to us was a colossal investment in buying our small stock of hides all those years ago.

Careful leather selection has to take place for each keyring .

Your keyring will be unique in terms of texture & colour ( no two are ever the same ) and the leather from which it is made has no equal in this modern world.

You are buying a tiny piece of history literally frozen in time dating back from the late 18th Century .

All the best stories start with ” It was a dark & stormy night……….” and this story is no exception !

In late November 1786 the Danish Brigantine ‘Metta Catherina’ set sail from the Russian Port of St.Petersburg bound for Genoa in Italy with a cargo of leather hides & hemp.

On 10th December 1786 she had reached a position off Plymouth on the South coast of England and sought shelter in Plymouth Sound from a  storm of increasing strength – but all to no avail as the storm continued to increase and the ship was then wrecked & lost.

Two centuries later ‘Metta Catherina’  was discovered by divers and some of the cargo was found to be in a remarkably good state of preservation after over 200 years on the sea bed.

Much of the leather had been very tightly bound which had resisted the ingress of water.

The leather had been tanned in the traditional Russian way using a tanning mixture loosely based on birch tar oil & willow bark .

Robin Snelson who was also involved in conserving the hides developed an oil emulsion which the hides were treated with .

At the time of supplying us with our own hides he provided us with some of this which we use to this day and it closely replicates the smoky birch oil aroma which our own hides had when we first received them.

In the late 18th Century Russian leather was of a quality never equalled before or since .

The supple hides had a rich depth of colour and a resistance to water and a smoky aroma which repelled attack by insects .

Other European tanneries wanted to know how it was produced and spies were sent at considerable personal risk to discover the secrets – but never did .

The secret of how the Russia leather was produced was never discovered and was finally lost forever during the turmoil of the Russian Revolution in 1917.

The quality of leather used to make cavalry boots & saddles could be decisive in winning a battle which could win or lose a kingdom –

Rather like the old story of the horseshoe nail where the kingdom was lost for the want of a horse shoe nail …….

For the want of the nail the shoe was lost ………

For the want of the shoe the horse was lost……….

For the want of the horse the rider was lost…..

For the want of the rider his message was lost…………

For the want of the message the battle was lost…….

For the want of the battle the kingdom was lost…………….and all for the want of a horseshoe nail .

Our keyrings are a little piece of this incredible story .

In addition to the keyring which can be bought in this listing most keyfob badges on keyrings listed in the website shop could be ordered re-mounted onto a Russia leather keyfob in either bottle, classic rectangular  or teardrop shape.

These cannot be ordered directly using the website shop – please email us with your requirements.

The listing photos include images of a booklet on the subject of the wreck which was published in 1987 .