E. E. Newton & Sons Leather Goods uses only the best Australian vegetable tanned leather. Vegetable tanning is the very labor intensive process of stabilizing the hide with the tannin found in all plant materials. Some plants are much higher in tannin which is present in the bark , leaves and in some cases the fruit. Black wattle Bark is famous for its high tannin content, this is what our forefathers used in northern Tasmania during the 19th century. Tree barking once provided a way of supplementing income for many locals.

Vegetable tanned leather has numerous advantages over chemically tanned leather. Vegetable tanning is a sustainable process that creates leather as by-product of the meat industry, it has unique molding abilities when cased(soaked in water) the leather becomes almost clay like enabling the craftsmen to mould the leather to shape and carve intricate designs into the the leather. Historically the leather was molded into shields and armor. The embossing and carving of vegetable leather really comes out in Western style saddles and gun belts, craftsmen can spend hundreds of hours meticulously carving and embossing leather goods.