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Photo courtesy of Jessica McIlroy
This past Saturday, November 3rd, a local designer marked a milestone with a party that also proved to be a very personal event. Lincoln Heller of Fiveleft Leather celebrated, and auctioned off, his 1000th bag at “A Night of Thousand Wonders” at the Robinson Studio Gallery in the Eastside.
All of Fiveleft’s leather is hand dyed and textured in the Vancouver studio using vegetable dyes, where about 90% of the products are also made. Each bag is signed and stamped with a number, thus the celebration of reaching the 1000th bag.
Fiveleft bags and wallets and leather goods were for sale at the event, with 50% of proceeds going to the Dalit Freedom Network. The charity works to the free the Dalits from a life of poverty, exploitation, and slavery through quality English education, healthcare, and economic development. The Dalits are also known as the Untouchables, a caste in India so low the are considered lower than animals, and all together would make up a population of the fourth largest country in the world.
The evening was emceed by comedian Gary Jones, and the Michael Simponselli trio filled the room with beautiful jazz. Lincoln gave a very heartfelt speech about the creation and growth of Fiveleft and all that it has brought him personally and professionally. And the auction was a great way to create excitement around, and have some fun, selling the gorgeous, hand-made, one-of-a-kind 1000th bag.
Jessica McIlroy: I’m curious about how you would define yourself, given that you were introduced to leather through logging camps, and leatherworking often has the connotation of a trade. But you have an artistic background. How do you see yourself?
Lincoln Heller: I think to answer that question, it would be a different word at different times. At a core level I’m an artist, then it become ‘craft person’ as the business started, because it is more about creating something piece by piece. ‘Designer’ moves into it more when looking at creating a brand and collections more the way that fashion defines it. What I’ve really realised is that my role is not just as a designer, I have this gift for creating an identity. I’m starting to work almost like an actor, the stuff I did at Eco Fashion Week has created this identity that is something bigger than ‘Lincoln’. So that character. In some ways, one word would be ‘character’, but it would also encompass all those other words.
JM: Where did the name “Fiveleft” come from?
LH: The easy definition is I’m left handed. The deeper reason, one that is harder to explain, is my relationship to words and language. I’ve always had my own type of language and if you get to know me, you know I have this slang way of communicating. I don’t really work well with formal communications like written word. Fiveleft comes from this language I’ve created in the brand. All the names of the bags and colours are two words together, any time I can put two words together I do. It originally comes from computer days of file names, back in the day with no spaces, with putting two words together. It was my first email address at university, it was my handle, and it just stuck ever since.
Photo courtesy of Jessica McIlroy
JM: What do you love about making bags that has kept you doing it for six years?
LH: The bags brought me into fashion and craft; I didn’t go that direction and pick a medium. I’ve always been fascinated with bags and containers. I would pick up a beautiful cardboard box that has this nice geometry and keep it for a while. What really fascinates me is people’s relationships to bags and wallets. You carry your life in this little thing. Even if you’re not a fashionable person and it’s not a fashion accessory.
JM: At what point did you think of the 1000th bag having significance?
LH: Five months or so ago. I number all of my bags, and as an artist moving into production, I thought it was beautiful to have aspect of an ‘edition’. So when I was getting close to 200, I thought, oh I’ll do the 200th next month because we aren’t busy, and sell it and do a landmark event. And the 200th is still sitting over there. The 1000th bag, as it came closer, was a bigger landmark obviously. I’m learning more about how the public views you, and the social interaction. There is this event that has been a driver for connections and I’m fascinated about how this medium is working. What is it that has made the event successful? The bag, my personality and connections, the timing of it? It’s very interesting.
Photo courtesy of Fiveleft Leather
JM: How much time did you spend thinking about what the bag would be like?
LH: The decision for the party came first. The design then came fairly quickly. It came from a passion, and the overall shape is a bag I used to make. It had to be retired because the hardware can no longer be sourced. The 1000th bag had to be something that, for me, is a much more mature Fiveleft. The craft of making the bag had to be the roots of a handcrafted bag. There was no sewing machine used, I hand stitched it. The handles are closer to me than anyone will understand because of my relationship to braiding and rope. Part of the bag is “Fiveleft”, but probably more of it is “Lincoln”. The basis of the bag was there, but it was also a design as you go. I braided five or six of the handles to see which would work. I didn’t really plan things ahead.
JM: What does the future hold for Fiveleft?
LH: I’ve got a manager now that is directing the bigger picture. As a small bag maker, you can’t come up with a new line each season, much less every year. It’s always been add a few more pieces, retire a few. I think there is one thing that will always be consistent and that is the material. The vegetable dyed leather and the texturing. The thing that is so Fiveleft, other than me, is the material. The challenge, and the value, is the material. The designs are unique because they have to be, they have to be different than what you can design with soft leather. But also there is a magic that happens with this kind of leather that doesn’t happen with other leathers. So the material will always be there. I’ve tried doing some other things but the passion isn’t there, it’s with bags. And people buy the passion, they can see it.
Fiveleft Leather bags and wallets can be found at Favourite in North Vancouver, Forsya on Main, Oh Brothers on Broadway, and at Circle Craft on Granville Island. You can also find Lincoln set up with his goods at the Circle Craft Christmas Market coming up this weekend, and the Eastside Culture Crawl Nov 16 - 18.
