At Stick & Ball, since inception we have maintained a commitment to the environment when designing and producing our products. In the case of our leather accessories, we choose end of life dairy cattle and a tanning technique called vegetable tanning. Producing our leather sustainably requires using long, slow and traditional techniques. 

This ancient technique used to treat leather dates back to 6000 B.C. Our leather is dyed in Tuscany, Italy using natural, environmental tannins such as berries, bark, nuts and foliage. Less than 10% of the world's leather is cured with vegetable tannins due to cost of materials and time and labor intensive technique.  It takes roughly two months to tan leather with vegetable tanning. The quick and popular, cheap alternative, chromium-tanned leather, involves treating the product with heavy metals for a day, which unfortunately is quite toxic to the environment as well as to the people processing the leather. 

The color, aromas and aging of the leather are all quite distinctive for vegetable tanned leather. We like to compare our pieces to an equestrian saddle. Over time the natural oils combined with use and the sun create a beautiful and distinctive patina for each piece. Whereas with chrome tanned leather, the leather will wear without the same character.

In addition, the aroma of vegetable tanned leather is like a perfume. The natural elements used create the leather, combined with the leather itself, creates a bouquet that is incomparable to chemically treated chromium leather.