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florida Hi everyone, I hope you all had happy holidays! I went up north this Christmas to visit my relatives, no snow but it was still really fun! I gave away the last two bears I own to my grandparents, they loved them 
. I was surprised however to get an old antique mink coat in return.. I never thought I would work with real fur since I am an animal lover. This coat has a lot of holes in it and no one else in my family wants it so I decided I would rather put the fur to good use than just see it thrown away in the trash. I think turning the coat into a bear would be a better way of honoring the animal. So now that I've got my morals sorted out I have no idea what to do with this thing. I can't really tell if it already has a lining... the back looks like thin strips (pencil width that run all the way up the coat) sewn together. If this is a liner on the back and not the actual leather & fur then do I need to reline it or should I just sew it how it is? I'll attach some pictures of the coat as soon as I can so that maybe you real fur experts out there can help a newbie like me! 
Another thing I was wondering is if it's possible to needle felt on real fur...?
Thank you all for your help!! I really do appreciate it! :hug:
Tami Eveslage Original Teddy BearsIt sounds like those are the fur strips and you will still need to line it. I am not an expert by any stretch in working with fur, although over the years I've been asked to make a few. I don't care for it. It is quite different from working with mohair, and now when folks ask---I refer them to artists who make real fur bears as a specialty! But if you have not done it before--you should try it for the experience.
mink is fun to work with ... when the leather still is ok :D
lining or not is not easy answered, some say you absolutely need to - others say dont do it, the leather doesnt like the heat.
i made 1 little bear from mink, i did line it, which made it hard to turn ... he was just 12 cm or so.
i also needed to pull all the longer hair out because it looked like a fur ball with them ...
so i would sugest you, dont make it to small if the hair are longer :D
needlefelting on leather - NO WAY
embrodering a nose on lether - just when you totaly lucky
the single pookes / stitches each make a hole into the leather, if there are enough holes close enough together, you can just take the leather out ....
i myself solved this problem on the allready finished head with a insert of the muzzle.
do some research on google about working with leather
you need to be careful how to cut the leather.
how to sew the leather
and a lot of other things
(i didnt care, i just lined it (wouldnt do that again) and used back stitches)
GJOYful BearsI used to think mink was the be all and end all however now I feel like anyone who can make a nice looking bear in mink is a God lol. I have only tried making a few and none have made it to the real world - all went to teddy bear heaven 
The kind of mink you describe is like the kind I worked with on my first bear and I was told the lines were not the actual pelt thicknesses, they were there to add strength to the coat. I still lined it which helped the strength of the coat, my problems came from a lot of other mistakes hee hee 
I sew very tiny stitches and all by hand, I am always being told my stitching looks like machine sewing so when I sewed like this on mink I just ripped the skin all the way around each piece and when i turned it RIPPPPP! Not fun.
Needle felting - no. There's no way I'd even want to try it after my experiences. I personally would choose now to use a molded clay nose so that there was no extra puncturing of the skin around the sensitive muzzle area of the bear.
I am by no means an expert in this field at all, far from it so please don't quote me I'm just saying from my own experience. Kathy Myers makes absolutely stunning mink bears and animals of which I am very lucky to have a couple of and I happened to think she's a genius hehe ~ I can't fathom how she makes such perfect creations from mink. Perhaps a mink expert will be along to view your post and help you out. In the mean time I happened to think you are BRAVE and need congratulating for venturing into mink bears! Best of luck and don't give up if your first bear in it isn't what you hoped for. Practice makes perfect.......... I keep telling myself this although I keep coming back to other mediums lol.
PennsylvaniaI never thought I would work with real fur since I am an animal lover.
Being an animal lover and liking fur are not mutually exclusive ideas.
The things people do, just waking up in the morning, like washing with soap, making coffee and driving their car to work do more collective damage to the environment, causing the deaths of native animals or preventing the births of new ones, than it would take to make ten fur coats.
Does this mean that I want everybody to like fur? Not at all! The last time I checked, we still lived in a free country. Make up your own mind. I'm just pointing out the fact that people who claim to be "animal lovers" often do not think about what effect their lives have on the lives of the animals they say they love.
I like your attitude of "We might as well put the fur to good use." :thumbsup:
We use cows for food so why not put the leather to good use? There are hundreds of things we use every day that are made from animal by-products. This is the attitude I prefer. We should use the environment wisely. Use animals and animal products for things we need but don't waste them.
The bottom line is that people can care about animals and still use fur.
P.S. -- People use rabbits for food. What happens to all that rabbit fur? I, for one, really like rabbit fur bears. We have several and they get petted often!
As for sewing leather and fur. Be sure to use a "Glover's needle."
Regular, round needles don't work on leather and fur very well. They are hard to push through and they don't make good stitches. A "Glover's needle" is flat and has sharp edges with a sharpened triangular point. It doesn't pierce the leather. It slices through.
When you get fur to work with you should check it three ways: Bend it, feel it and smell it.
Bend the leather to see if it is still soft and supple. If it is not, the leather will eventually crack and fall apart.
Feel the fur to see if it is still soft. Old, improperly cared for fur will be stiff and coarse. Good fur will be soft and the hairs will not fall out. If you have any hair falling out, the fur is past its prime.
Finally, smell the fur. Does it smell rich and "musky" like leather? Or, does it smell like a dead animal? If the fur smells bad, it is probably beginning to rot.
I'm with you. Making Bears out of fur is hard.
I've seen furriers make Bears out of fur and the construction is good but the Bears, themselves, are lacking.
I've seen Bearmakers make Bears out of fur and the design is good but the construction isn't great.
People who can make well-designed, well constructed Bears out of fur are, as you say, "Like unto God."
florida Thank you all again for the helpful bear making tips and moral advice!
Tami- You were right about those being fur strips, as I started to take the coat apart I got a better look at them and I see now that it is not a lining. I think I will give it a try, and if it doesn't work out maybe I can find someone who makes fur bears that would like the remaining pieces.
Thondra- The coat has a lot more holes in it than I first realized.. and a lot of duct tape 
. I think I'll line it like you did. You said that you solved the problem by inserting in a muzzle, was the muzzle you inserted needle felted that you then sewed on? I've heard of people doing this... but I haven’t seen what this technique actually looks like on a bear.
Gabriele- Thank you for the tips, the clay nose is a great idea!!! I hope I can at least make something from this coat so that it doesn't all go to waste 
.
Us bears- I agree with you completely, being an animal lover means more than just avoiding fur coats and pelts. I take a lot of extra steps to protect the environment and I try my best to do my part. I rarely eat meat (never red meat), I bike whenever I can instead of driving, no coffee for me 
, all of my household appliances are energy savers, and I volunteer and donate regularly at my local animal shelter. I was hesitant because I am so cautious about the environment and honestly know little to nothing about how antique fur coats are created. Hopefully through recycling this old coat I can gain more knowledge about the process as well as preserve and honor the lives of these specific animals. Thank you for the information about the needles, I had no idea regular ones wouldn’t work. The fur seems to be in good condition just going by the advice you gave me, so hopefully things will go as smoothly as they possibly can
florida Here are the pictures as promised.
Chaska, MinnesotaI love making Minkies. If want to learn about sewing with real fur, Nancy Tillberg has written a book on it. Here is the link:
PennsylvaniaThat stripped effect you see is called "letting out."
The unsewn pelts are put in a machine that looks kind of like an industrial spaghetti cutter that cuts them into thin strips. Those strips are sewn into panels that are fitted to the part of the coat the furrier wants to use them in. Then, those panels are assembled into the completed coat.
Fur coats made of pelts that are not cut into strips are called "skin-on-skin." The fur pelts are just sewn together, piece by piece to make a coat.
The idea of letting out the skins before making a coat is to allow the garment to "break" or "fall" over the shape of the wearer without looking like a giant sack.
It's similar to the way ladies dress jackets are made with "darts" in the sides to allow it to fit over the bust. If a lady wore a mens' dress jacket it would just look like she's wearing a large bag over her body. With the darts, the jacket conforms to the body.
Furriers let out pelts when making a coat for a similar reason as tailors put darts in ladies' jackets only letting out is taken to the extreme.
Most fur coats made today are sewn from a combination of "let out" pelts and "skin on skin" pelts.
The reason is that you don't need the coat to be let out in all places. The furrier doesn't want to waste the time and labor costs to make a "fully let out" coat when it's not needed.
Think about the sweep of a full length coat. (The sweep is the bottom part that is nearest the floor.)
Does the sweep need to be fully let out? No. It just hangs there.
However, the part that breaks over the wearer's shoulders and chest should be let out so that the garment falls right. If it's going to be a custom fitted fur coat, maybe you would want the sides and the waist to be let out but that's something that needs to be decided on a case-by-case basis.
So, you see, the main reason fur coats are so expensive is because of labor costs to sew the furs together.
Every one of those strips of let-out fur have to be cut apart and sewn together by hand before finally being assembled into a finished coat.
If I was you, here's what I would do:
Disassemble the coat into it's main component parts: The sleeves, the back panel, the front panels, etc., etc.
Leave the let-out sections intact. Don't disassemble into strips.
Lay the fur panels face down onto a piece of plywood or something similar. Wet the leather with a sponge then staple down to the board. Be sure to stretch the leather nice and tight. Not so tight you damage it. Just tight enough to lay flat. (Kind of like the way you upholster a chair.)
Now, get your pattern out and lay it over the fur and decide how you want to cut out the shapes. Think about the way the let-out strips fit into the design of the Bear. When you have it all planned out, use a marker and trace the pattern onto the leather side of the fur and proceed to cut and sew as you normally would.
When you are working with fur, the planning and design phases are the most important.
As you are taking the original coat apart, I suggest that you look at how they are assembled and how the orientation of the let-out strips affect the lay of the garment. Then, when you are reassembling the coat into a Bear, you can use the information you learned in disassembling the coat so that you know how to best assemble the Bear.
I love fur Bears so I'm really interested to see how your first fur Bear works out! 
Creative Design Studio (RKR4CDS)and a lot of duct tape
UH-OH. Any residue left from the adhesive backing on that canNOT be good!!
And trying to remove it with anything will only make the leather worse... (who would've placed duct tape on the inside of a mink coat??)
Duct tape sticks like the devil for about seventeen days and then dries up and falls off, leaving its sticky stuff - stuck in place and the tape on the floor.
Randy, youre truly a Renaissance Man - a lot of knowledge about just about everything!! I have yet to see you stumped by any subject. (please head on over to my latest Mac/tech question to see if you have an answer there too!)
Little Bear GuyIn the furrier business they use a lining type of fabric in making the coats. It is sticky on one side similar to duct tape but the non sticky side is a different material. This does not arm the leather and they have used this process in making coats for many many yrs, the bear should be lined for durability and the bear will last longer. As for the inside face, it is made from another fabric, mohair or alpaca or even cashmere. You could needle felt it but you would have to still make an inset out of another fabric in order to needle felt into it as you can't needle felt into the fur or leather as it will not work.
Hope this helps
Shane
florida Thank you all for your wonderful tips!!! As I started my first mink bear I referrenced back to this page often :hug: . I finally finished the head... its definetly not perfect and hes a little odd looking bear but he is lined properly, needlefelted only where I put in the insert muzzle, and sewn with the right needles ! I've only just begun and so far this has been a great learning experience!
Kitchener OntarioOMG the head is gorgeous!!!! I can hardly wait to see the finished bear!!!!!!
Beautiful Heidi! You must be thrilled and raring to give him a body how did you find working with the real fur? Asking as an intimidated wannabe lol.
PennsylvaniaHoly cow! That's AWESOME! 
I'm not kidding!
If the rest of the Bear looks as good as what you've got there, it'll be the best real fur Bear I've ever seen!
AWESOME is right! :clap: :clap: :clap: A true artist creates beauty (says me), and that's exactly what you do, Miss Heidi. :hug:
Becky
OMG thats awesome !!!
it looks absolute perfekt !!
Past Time BearsSuper work! :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap: :clap:
Bears by EdieWow! That's incredible! And this is your FIRST real fur bear!!!!!
desertmountainbearMy goodness he is looking so good Heidi.
Joanne
Awesome face!!!!!!
florida Thank you all!! I couldn't have gotten this far without your help!! :hug: :hug: :hug:
Karenaus- I didn't think working with the fur was really any harder than mohair, the actual steps to prepare it is time consuming though... I doubt if I would do it again just because I can't needle felt on it but I think you should definetly give it a try!!! I will probably have a lot of big scraps left over, just let me know if you want them! :hug:
Chaska, MinnesotaThat is darn tootin good for a first try! :clap:
Belper, DerbyshireWow! He's gorgeous!
