Salmon Leather

John Fitzgerald went from catching fish to thinking of perhaps the ultimate waste reclamation project of our generation. With farmed salmon becoming ever more popular, did you ever ask yourself, "what happened to the skins of all this fabulous smoked salmon?" Well, John did. And now he collects the skins, shaved to the millimeter off of the precious flesh which humans consume, and develops them into a fine leather for wallets, handbags, belts, and even one-of-a-kind mini-skirts or vests. The leather is longer lasting than traditional cow leather due to the challenges salmon skin faces over its lifetime: from freshwater to saltwater.

The tanning process was developed by John Fitzgerald over three years, and invovles a vegetable tanning agent, which thickens and reinforces the natural matrix of the fish skin, resulting in a long-lived and resilient leather, alleged to be superior to alligator skin. You will be happy to hear the soft and flexible final product doesn't smell at all like fish. You can learn more at Irish Salmon Skin Leather or funkifish.