The Bridge Production Process - Attention to the detail
The Bridge Manufacturing process has been the main-stay of their success and will remain so for years to come. Since 1969 these traditional leather handling techniques have been used by the bridge for their main classic leather range. We sometimes call it the vegetal tanned leather or classic analine leather - Just to confuse you even more the Bridge refer to it as the "01" leather.
Starting with the tanning process - The Bridge leather is put in to a large rotating oak barrel for up to 7 to 10 days, the tanning process uses a Vegetal tanning solution. The solution consists of natural tannins only, they are extracted from wood, bark, leaves and fruit.
This preserves the leather and provides it with the supple feel we all know and love.
The Bridge have used the same leather tannery since 1970 - IL Gabbiano also in Tuscany specialise in the bridge classic leather - they are viewed by the Bridge as the best in their field.
After the Tanning of the leather in the oak drums it is washed before going on to the dying process, again this is a vegetal based dye - Tree Bark is the main ingredient - The dying process takes around 7 to 10 days for each hide to absorb the dye - No hide will absorb the dye the same - they are all different.
The Hide used for the Classic Bridge leather is old Italian Bull - this hide has had many years of life and as such has a large amount of character and graining - plus it is thick and durable.
Hand Finishing of the Bridge leather - After the dying process every piece of Bridge leather is individually inspected by hand before the final amber hand finishing is applied. This process brings out the unique chestnut glow that is attributed to The Bridge leather.
The Bridge leather is then ready to go for hand selection and cutting to shape.
Hours of design and research go in to a bridge handbag - Their approach to design is a timeless one - not specific to a particular season - they design for longevity with a view to the bag lasting many years, even with use every day.
The leather is cut to shape using the best grain patina for each product, this attention to detail is slow but we get the best piece of grain patern possible at the time for the item being produced.
Hand buffing of the cut edge is done using a rotary buffing tool. The cut edges are matched together in the assembly process and then smoothed together using a roller, they are then hand coloured and hand brushed. Before the bag etc is completed it goes through yet another edge colouring treatment to make sure it is the best it can be. The Bridge are the only manufacturer that goes to this attention to detail with this process.
Hand stitching the pieces together is the only way it can be done, this technique is used by saddlers today, the stitch design and throw help to emphasise the design. As part of this method The Bridge use a thread thickness 10 - it is what they are known for.
The cutting out is all done by hand.
Edge trimming by hand
Assembly all by hand
Screws are used on locks and brass fittings - a type of locktite solution is added to the threads to help them stay in place - The idea is that the screws can be removed years down the line for maintenance and repair.
The edges of the piece are aligned by hand and eye before being hand stitched using the saddlery technique.
The leather is pre-cut before it is put in to the workshop, the Bridge have small individual craft workshops they use, they are spread around Florence, each work shop or artisan has their own speciality and skill level.
At the end of the week the pieces that are complete go through a strict quality check procedure before being placed on the storage shelf - ready for us to place our orders. It generally takes 3 months from placing the order to it landing in our shop. There is a core range of items - known as the best sellers - these can arrive within a couple of weeks - depending on how busy they are.
TWO YEAR Warranty - Fair wear and tear - The Bridge are one of the very few companies that do this - they give a two year guarantee on workmanship - they are that confident of the workmanship & quality - We have been retailers of Bridge since 2001 and would agree with them - we get very few problems at all.
I hope you found the pictures and the story interesting - we are so pleased that the Bridge provided them to us.
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