About John
Working with leather is my passion, I have been doing so since my mid twenties. Back then I was living in California, where I took a keen interest in medieval and renaissance lifestyle. Shooting archery and creating leather armor was my hobby. That was back in the early 90s. Since then I took a desk job and concentrated on my career in title insurance to enjoy the finer things of life, like watches, cars, motorcycles and hanging out with friends. In 2011 I decided to move to Germany with my wife to start something new and exciting, my own business and which was the beginning of Dangerous9straps.
Every day, I do my very best to make these little works of art for my customers – entirely handmade and stitched by myself. In my work, I am driven to explore new ways, especially in terms of construction and layering. All structural support comes from leather without the help of metal or plastic inserts which are prone to put stress on the leather and eventually break down the surrounding material.
We take pride that our straps are hand cut and burnished. Then hand saddle stitched using French linen threads. Every stage of the strap making process described above is done by hand with incredible attention to detail.
My goal is to produce the very best watch straps possible by using natural elements: To find these leathers my wife and I regularly travel to Italy and France. We also work with our suppliers and their tanneries to procure the most sophisticated leathers possible as well as develop new custom finishes and colors.
Our Manufactured Collection straps are intended to continue this entirely handmade tradition while at the same time offering my strap designs to a wider audience and with much faster delivery times. My hope is that by having some of our most popular straps made for us, those of you who want a Dangerous9strap, but don’t necessarily need to have every last detail of a bespoke design will find the straps from our Manufacture Collection a really exciting alternative. While I won’t be personally building these straps, this will not mean that we will be compromising in any way on the qualities that are the hallmarks of Dangerous9straps. We have been working for nearly 3 years with our Italian manufacturer partners to design and build straps to the very same high standards as the fully bespoke straps, which are still made entirely by hand, by me here in Germany.
