A very special tanning brew using the leaves of Olives; this brew has been patented and is named Olivenleder® (Olive Leather in English).
In 2017 Tricker’s began a partnership with Weinheimer, a worldwide renowned tannery in Germany and Wet-Green, a team of tanning liquor specialists again in Germany. The partnership began as a leap of faith towards sustainably tanned leather that is genuinely the real deal. We created a small collection using Olivvia leather tanned by Weinheimer using Olivenleder liquor, a tanning brew developed from nothing other than Olive leaves by Dr Heinz-Peter Germann in Wet Green’s lab.
Olivenleder® is an entirely organic brew and all waste can be used as a natural fertiliser including the leaves and leather shavings. The olive leaves are entirely sustainable and are a bi-product of the Olive Oil industry which are traditionally burnt, millions of which fall during the Olive harvest and are traditionally burnt.
Traditionally Olive leaves fall from Olive trees during the harvest and in many cases are burnt – Wet Green have found through scrupulous tests that the brew from Olive leaves have truly unique tanning capabilities found in no other vegetable or organic matter. As a result, use has been found a waste product and what’s more, the waste from the tanning is purely organic and makes great fertiliser for the grounds that Tricker’s wearers have cultivated since 1829. It is a natural phenomenon to think that two waste products of the food industry (Hides and Olive leaves) can combine to create something luxurious and hard-wearing.
Weinheimer already set the standards in tanning, their hides are of the highest quality, traceable to each farm and cow they derived from. Their tanning processes are efficient, clean and their workforce are experts in the field. To tan with Olivenleder, Weinheimer have created a separate tanning line, one which is clear of metal traces (as is required of all tanneries using the liquor).
The result is Olivvia, the highest quality hides, tanned using Olivenleder (that is edible) to the highest specification and setting the bar in tanning standards. This is sustainable, luxurious leather with no tricks.
At Tricker’s we have learnt to work with Olivvia leather, a material different to traditionally dyed hides – the whole tanning process is gentler and therefore our shoemakers have unlearned so much of what they know to account for this. A two-year development has allowed us to now continually broaden our usage of Olivvia leather.
