In the extensive cereal plains of Castile is the town of Villarramiel. Many of its neighbors are dedicated to the artisan tanning of the leather in the different tanneries that are still preserved. In almost all of them, modern machines have been incorporated into the skin transformation process, maintaining that formula that does not alter the quality of the final product. But there is one in which the working technique and the tools used have hardly been modified, and it preserves that traditional flavor that differentiates the pure artisan: it is Alfredo Sánchez's tanning factory . “This is conserving the skin. You add the salt and you have three or four days with salt for the blood to leave, it is what takes care of the skin, and once salted, it can last up to 5 years, if not, in 24 hours the skin is destroyed. " Sometimes, our friend Alfredo receives the skins already salted and preserved directly by the butchers, but usually he takes care of adding the salt himself. The winter months are the best for this job, as the salt liquefies easily and penetrates better into the pores of the skin. "Now like this, it can be kept for up to five years, being very salty as it is." Once the skins are salted, Alfredo keeps them piled up until he decides to tan. The skins can be perfectly preserved with salt for several years. To tan them, Alfredo first selects them by size and quality and then takes them to the soaking pile. The soaking pile holds about 250 skins. There, our friend the tanner places them stretched out so that they are in direct contact with running water for a few days until they soften, the dirt comes out and the salt that has preserved them is removed. “It depends on how thick they are and how dry they are. These, for example, have to stay for a week. " In the tanning process, the salt could delay hair removal and prevent the skin from swelling in subsequent operations. During a week of soaking in the sink, all the salt has been extracted. On the fleshing board, our friend the tanner cuts the heads and all the waste that the skins carry. If the pieces are very large, he breaks them into two halves to handle them better. Alfredo throws the skins inside the drum to proceed to waxing, which aims to remove the epidermis, hair and wool. At the same time, the number of skins is controlled to be able to calculate the proportional mixture of slaked lime and sodium sulphide that must be added to the drum. The mixture of lime and sulfur will exert an energetic action on the skin , will swell it, dissolve the epidermis, hair and wool and will attack horny materials. Alfredo incorporated the hype into the traditional process very few years ago, which was a considerable advance . Until then, all the work of preparing the skins for tanning was done in wells called caleros where they had to be soaked for several days, continuously stirring them. Today, with the uniform turning of the drum for five hours, the lime and sulfur act quickly because they keep all the calories in the hermetic interior. After five hours, Alfredo opens the drum and the water carries away all the dirt, hair and wool that have come off. The skins have taken the blue color of sulfur and to wash them the tanner passes them one by one through a bath of clear water. The drum has a capacity for about 500 sheepskins, depending on their size. Now comes the time to fleshed the skins. Fleshing on the table, which is a cut tree trunk more than 200 years ago, our friend tanner with the blade removed all the rough edges still are attached to the skin, such as meat, fats, membrane materials, ... The The edge of the steel blade wears easily and every two or three fleshed hides the tanner has to go through the file to enliven it. “It is eating little by little. When it is good steel it takes a long time to eat, if it is steel you sharpen it and after two days you have already eaten it, it is a very soft steel that is worth nothing. The steel from before was very good. " Once the meat is removed from the skins, it is put into the drum to tenderize. Alfredo throws the skins back into the drum to give them all the preparation baths that are necessary before tanning. The first process is called deliming and consists of removing the lime with a bath of ammonium sulfate, during two or three days of continuous rotation of the drum. Another three or four days they need the skins to soften going around in the drum with a bath of "rindiente". Half a day more with coarse salt and sulfuric acid in a bath called “pickling”, and with another five or six hours stirring with “sintanol”, the skins will be ready for tanning. In the deliming, rendering and "pickling" processes, not only absorbed chemical agents and remaining impurities are eliminated , but the skin also swells. "Now take the skins out of the drum to tan them." After a week inside the drum, the skins are properly prepared, that is, clean, plucked and swollen, and they are ready to be converted into leather by the action of the tanning materials. “Now, throw them to tan. What is used is tannin, oak bark. " Currently, our friend the tanner acquires the oak bark already prepared for use and should not make it as in other times. "Before it was taken from the mountains, ground at home and thrown away." Alfredo the tanner introduces the skins into the two windmills, since according to their size they must stay for a certain time. “That depends, if they are thin for less time and if they are fat for longer. If they are fat, fifteen days and if they are thin, in six days, half. " Heat also plays a role in this process: In summer the skins need less time to tan than in winter. Our friend Alfredo works the skins of all kinds of animals, from the largest like cows or horses to the smallest like snakes. “There is everything here. This pile looks like Noah's ark, there are suckling pigs, lambs, dogs, everything, steers, this is a calf, you see, what happens is that it is a thin calf. " Each pinwheel holds about 200 medium- sized skins . In order for them to be well tanned, they will remain soaked in the tannin solution for several days depending on their size. "Now, then, you are here for 15 days and those for a week." Alfredo controls the work of the windlasses, especially to prevent the skins from catching on the shaft or on the blades. During the tanning days, the mills are only put into operation for a few minutes so that all the hides receive the action of the tannin bath. “Now it has to be until tomorrow. now it is not given until tomorrow, because if you give it a lot it starts to take ..., it takes a foam that can no longer be given. Tomorrow they are more swollen, they have already sucked the tannin, and that is when it can be done well, because now it throws all the water and everything at you. " When they are already tanned, Alfredo removes the skins from the pinwheels and spreads them on a bench. There you will leave them to drain for a couple of days. Before proceeding with the leather preparation work, the hides are washed again in the tap of running water. Then, Alfredo places them on a bench so that they are well stretched and they drain. When the hides are already dry, the tanner makes the buttonholes with the knife to hang them from the ceiling. Once tanned, the hides have different properties than they had before and are called leathers. Afterwards, Alfredo proceeds to smoothing the hides, which consists of “removing the vein”, as the tanners say. "Let the skin stay stretched, well stretched, because all skin has a vein, and of course, stretching it removes the vein." To do this, he passes the "stretch", which is an iron blade, over the grain of the skin, still wet, which is the face that had the hair. When the hides are smoothed, Alfredo takes them up to the drying room to hang them from the ceiling and remove the moisture that still remains. The drying of the skins depends on the ambient temperature, and therefore in the hot summer months they need a few hours or at most a day, while in the winter they take more than a week to remove all the moisture. When they are dry, our friend the tanner takes them down and places them on the table to remove all the repelles, level them and leave them well finished. One by one, smooth the skins with the "stretch" and go over the entire contour of the skin with the knife. On the work table, Alfredo places several skins one on top of the other with the flower facing upwards to grease them and give them color. "This is put oil to take the aniline, two tasks are done at the same time, grease and dye." "Sunflower oil, sunflower oil." In the sunflower oil, which the tanner needs to grease the leathers, he has mixed aniline of the color he wants to give the leather, usually yellow or orange. When the skins are greased, they are left lying on the ground for a day or two so that they absorb the oil and color well. To trim the leathers, Alfredo needs a sharpened steel tool called a “trim strip”. Before starting his work, he goes over the cut with the file. This cutting operation consists of scratching the skin on the part of the meat to make it more flexible and thin, according to the tastes of the client. “To the extent that the consumer wants, the one who buys it. The most frequent, then 2 mm. to make footwear. " "To do fine things it has to be 1 mm." Alfredo's experience is enough to calculate the thickness of the leather pieces by eye and by touch. "After this, the next step is to soften it up." When lowering the leather, the edges have been left with a fluff and they have to be trimmed so that the piece is perfect. “Now it's corking it, softening the skin. This is called cork, it is a cork placed in a piece of wood. " Alfredo performs the corking operation by folding the skin, grain against grain, and rubbing over it with the cork. In this way the skin moves and rubs against itself, giving the surface a shiny and velvety appearance. “This is called stretching the skin. Remove the grain that has come out of the quilt and polish it too. " Depending on how the leather will be used, it will need a more elaborate finish. Alfredo removes the grain and polishes the flower with a marble “stretch”. "For calzau, for leather goods, for crafts, for everything, in general for everything." The tanned skins have already been made available for sale. Alfredo Sánchez's clients are generally leather artisans who are looking for a quality raw material made entirely by hand. In the end, those skins obtained from the slaughtered and hand-tanned animals will become objects of daily use or ornamental in the hands of shoemakers, saddlers and other leather artisans.
