How to Tan Skins & Make Leather

Prepare your animal hide by properly removing the skin. You should skin the dead animal so that all the meat and fat is free from the skin.

Soak the skin in a bowl of water and pound it repeatedly with a rubber hammer to ensure all the meat and fat is removed. After the skin has soaked, lay it to dry on a wooden beam. Scrape the skin with a dull knife to reduce the chance of creating a tear.

Flip the hide over so the fur is facing you. Rub the fur with quicklime or wood ash and allow it to soak.

Scrape the fur off of the skin with your dull knife, again ensuring you do not tear the skin.

Rub the skin with tallow or egg yolks to keep it from rotting and stiffening while you complete the tanning process. If you would like to create a pale leather, consider rubbing the skin with salt at this stage.

Bate the skin by rubbing it with Borax or baking soda. Traditionally, people would use manure from a carnivore, but Borax and baking soda will give the skin the necessary elasticity without the unpleasant smell of the manure.

Wash the Borax or baking soda off of the skin with water and dish soap.

Soak your hide in water and crushed oak bark to make tannin. You may also use a commercially created tannin if that would be easier.

Allow the hide to dry for a few days in a clay-lined pit. Hang your wooden beam across the pit to keep your hide from becoming marred by the clay.

Remove the hide from the pit after a few days and place it flat to dry.

Create any clothing item you wish with the leather.