What is Silverback?

Designed For Silverbacks, Not For Chimps

Just The Silverback Collection is a more sleek and refined, sophisticated executive style collection of leather goods of Saddleback Leather. Is Saddleback Classic or Silverback your style?

Saddleback Classic or Silverback?

Just Indiana Jones or James Bond? Whose style do you identify with?

Saddleback Classic and Silverback
The Same Saddleback Ethos with Distinct Differences

Similarities

• Same durable, no breakable parts construction i.e. zippers, snaps, magnets, velcro etc.
• Same 100 Year Warranty
• Same reinforced stress points
• Same custom overkill 316 Stainless Steel hardware, the strongest we know of on any bag in history
  
  

Differences in Materials

• Both are lined with skin.
  • Classic Saddleback designs are lined with tough and luxurious pigskin.
  • Silverback designs are lined with durable and buttery goatskin.
• Both are built with the toughest leather on the planet, Full Grain.
  • For Classic designs, we chose 2 - 2.2mm thick Chrome tanned work boot leather for many specific reasons, like a strong patina and the broken in look.
  • For Silverback designs, we chose the same smooth and more buttery 1.8 - 2mm thick Italian vegetable tanned leather we use for our high level Officer’s Boots. It has a tighter fiber structure. We also finished the leather so it does not patina as much
    
    

Similarities in Design Aesthetic

• Same natural marbled leather to remove all doubt it’s leather.
• Same triangles and threes in design
• Same Saddleback curves and corner radiuses
• Same contrasting hardware
  
  

Differences in Design

• Both use industrial strength single filament Polyester thread:
  • Classic designs are usually double stitched for a sturdy over-engineered look. Silverback designs are single stitched to give it a sleeker more refined look.
  • Classic designs are sewn with a heavy gauge thread at 5 stitches per inch to give it a more rugged texture. Silverback designs are sewn with a thread one gauge thinner and at 7 stitches per inch to give a smoother cleaner appearance.
• Saddleback Classic designs have lose straps and more shadows to give more depth. Silverback designs have sewn on straps and fewer shadows to give it a simpler look and feel.
• Classic designs have raw edges and Silverback have cleanly painted edges
• Classic Saddleback has rivets refinforcing all stress points. Silverback has extra stitching reinforcing and no rivets except for the three nickel plated rivets on the Saddleback shield.
  

Match the Accessory to the Occasion

Doctors, Lawyers, Pilots, Judges and Engineers all love our professional yet down to earth and approachable style of the Saddleback Classic leather goods. But there’s something else in me that needs a little more sophisticated looking bag for more serious or formal occasions. Just as you don’t wear only one pair of shoes for all occasions, so it is with a leather bag. It should be an accessory to what you are wearing.

Rolls Royce put Saddleback Leather’s Trunk in their coffeetable book and I went to London for the launch. A well dressed man walked by carrying a leather briefcase that would have looked the part on the train or in the office, but not at that event. It was clear to everybody, the dude borrowed the suit. He was clearly not a Silverback because he was not carrying a bag like a Silverback would have carried at an event like that. Don’t be that guy. Carry the style of briefcase that fits the situation.

Silverback Brand Feel

• Tough Yet Refined Look - The James Bond who bleeds look
  • Stately
  • Professional
    
    • Board Room
    • Corner Office
    • Financial District
  • Classy
  • Fine
  • Quality
  • Refined
  • Kingly
  • Presidential
  • James Bond
  • Bond Street
  • High Street
  • Classical History
  • Latin
  • Greek
  • Boardroom
  • Fine Italian Quality
  • Intellectual
  • Business
  • Serious
  • Trustworthy
    
    

Musical Instruments

• Violin
• Cello
• Clarinet
• Piano
• Symphony
• Classical Guitar
  
  

Transportation

• Classic English Cars
• Aston Martin
• Bentley
• Rolls Royce
• Jaguar
• Yacht
• Wooden Boat
  • Small Sailboat
  • Schooner
  • Sloop
• Range Rover
  • Offroad version - Classic Series 3 Land Rover or Range Rover
    
    

Colors

• Tan
• Dark Reddish / Burgundy Brown
• Dark Green
• Black
• Navy Blue
  
  

Clothing and Fashion Accessories

• Scarves
• Cuff Linksn
• Ascots
• Fountain Pens
• Wooden Umbrella
• Swiss watch
• Pocket Square handkerchief
• Bespoke Suit (Savile Row)
• John Lobb Shoes
• Collared Shirts
• Matching Belt
• Tie
• Slacks
• Tucked in Shirt
• Well put together
• Shinier
• Clean and simple
• Less Color
• Narrow
• Dark Trench coat
• Dark ¾ length coat
• Wool sweater
• Waist coats - Vests
• St. Barts
  
  

Geographical Location

• United Kingdom
  • English cottage on the coast weekend home
  • Cliffs of Dover
  • Scotland
    • Highlands
    • Edinburough
  • Oxford Library
  • Cambridge Campus
  • British Museum
  • Royal Geographical Society
  • Natural History Museum
  • Trafalgar Square
  • National Gallery in London full of works of art
  • Downtown London
    • Bond Street
    • St. James Street
    • Downing Street
    • Big Ben and Parliament
    • Tower Bridge in London
    • Windsor Castle
• Northern Mediterrainian
  • Greece
    • Parthenon
    • Agora
    • Santorini
  • Monaco
• Swizterland
  • Zurich
  • Swiss Alps
• Austria
  • Vienna
  • Salzburg
    • Marionette Theatre
• France
  • Paris
  • French Riviera
  • French Alps
  • Arch de Triumph
  • Eiffel Tower
  • The Louvre in Paris
• Lighthouses
• Marinas
• Grassy hills with sheep
  
  

Decor

• Fine art
• Realistic Paintings
• Darker colors
• Vases
• Realistic Sculptures
• Bust of a classic character
• Dark green walls
• Dark wood
• Encyclopedia Leatherbound set in Library
• Newspapers
• Crown Molding
• Roman Mosaics of chariots
• Greek Mythology
  
  

Historical figures

• English
  • Winston Churchill
  • Sir William Blackstone
  • David Livingstone
  • C.H. Spurgeon
  • Hudson Taylor
• The Classics
  • Cicero (Roman)
  • Plato (Greek)
  • Socrates (Greek)
  • Caesars - Marcus Aurelius (Roman)
    
    

Brands

• Truefitt and Hill barbershop
• Fortnum and Mason
• Rolex
• Mont Blanc
• Rolls Royce
• Bentley
• Range Rover
  
  

Drinks

• Hot tea
• Espresso
• Wine
  
  

Sports and Hobbies

• Equestrian
• Sailing
• Flyfishing
• Pheasant Hunting
• Shooting
  • Over Under shotguns
• Chess
• Billiards
• Fencing

Silverback Brand and Descriptions

Saddleback Leather Co.
Classic Or Silverback

Indiana Jones or James Bond? Whose style do you most identify with? Both are Silverbacks in their professions; the wisest, most respected, experienced and most feared by the opposition. Both were professionals and would carry a high quality leather

What Would Indiana Jones Carry?

Indiana Jones was a warm, approachable and down to earth professional university professor who spent time with high ranking officials and spent a lot of time outdoors. He wore a brown tweed suit or a dark brown leather jacket and carried a well worn, scuffed but solid brown leather bag. His approachable down to earth style signaled reliability, humility and authenticity.

What Would James Bond Carry?

James Bond was a polished and refined gentleman who spent a lot of time with the upper crust of society and in professional indoor settings. He wore black, charcoal or navy bespoke suits with cufflinks. Or he wore suit jackets and carried a shinier sleek and highly maintained leather bag. His style signals decisiveness, discipline and precision and it instills trust and confidence.

Introducing

The Silverback Collection

The Silverback Collection is for the suit wearing, cufflink donning executive, banker or financier who prefers a little more polish and shine; a more sleek and sophisticated look and feel for boardrooms or for a more refined style.

In 2010, while gorilla trekking deep in the Virunga National Forest of Rwanda, I had the idea of the Silverback Collection. The Silverback gorilla is the most mature, dominant and respected beast of the jungle mountains and that made me think I needed to design a collection of leather bags for the Silverbacks of the business world. And I’ve steadily been working on those designs ever since.

I wasn’t mentally able to complete this collection until I deeply understood this most complicated design style. It appears simple and plain, but it is more complex than anything. Steve Jobs once said, “Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple”.

An excellent business or design or life is made up of a thousand excellent details. Here are some of the details I learned that make Silverback feel so classy.

Since 2010, I have paid attention to why some designs seemed classier and more sophisticated and others seemed more down to earth and stout. This is my list of those design features that you will see throughout Silverback. No one single feature makes a design formal or sleek, but when all of them are incorporated into one design, it gives a more refined result.

Silverback Sophisticated and Refined Design Details

• Fewer Shadows: The Saddleback design vibe, in general, is simple and plain because the simpler the better, with fewer pockets or pieces to cast shadows. The Silverback collection is even more so. Even the old fashioned Gladstone closure is facing to the back, so there is no horizontal shadow along the top edge.
  
• Less Texture: Single stitching instead of double. Straps sewn on flat. Almost no rivets visible.
• Finer Stitching - Seven stitches per inch with a very thin needle with a very strong medium thickness thread to reduce the shadows of the needle holes.
• Non-contrasting thread: I didn’t want the bag to look too busy with a white or bright thread. I feel that gives a more sporty look.
• Flat Body: The inner structure of the bag was designed to keep bags flat and and not to go wavy over time, but not to be too flat. It has to have a fullness to it.
• Crisp Hardware: The sharp brightness of our custom 316 Stainless Steel contrasts with the leather and gives it a cleanly dressed and sharp feel.
• Finished Edges: Edges are accents and the paint color is in the same family as the leather color. I specifically chose a Semi-gloss finish to make it cleaner.
• Thick Enough Edges: The edges are not wimpy thin or bulky thick, but rather proportional to the size of the bag.
• Narrow Lines: The narrower the belts, strips, shoulder straps and handles are, the more refined and professional the feel. Too narrow gives a delicate feel and too wide makes it casual.
• Anchors: All strap tips, as well as all buckle, handle and shoulder strap anchors have the same chiseled shape to balance out and give a masculine edge to the smooth, sleek and shinier design.
• Steel Feet: Each large briefcase and duffle bag comes with specialty Stainless Steel feet to keep it off the ground.
• Leather Style: Most refined bags are made with painted Top Grain leather that has no character and makes you wonder if it is possibly vinyl. I wanted Full Grain with bold veins. A James Bond that bleeds. And the tough thick boot leather version of it.
• Leather Appearance: Smooth, not textured. Shiny, but not sissy glossy. This leather was designed to be harder to scratch and not patina much.
• Leather Type: I needed a very expensive Italian Vegetable tanned leather to make these specific designs look the way they do. Chrome tanned leather is excellent, but it is not stiff enough to give the longtem look I envisioned. Our Vegetable tanned leather is tighter and therefore stiffer than Chrome and also water-resistant. That’s why we use the same leather for our Officer’s Boots. Our Italian tannery is second to none for this type of leather in the world.
• Goatskin Lining: No fabric here. Just pure, natural, tough and buttery smooth goatskin. It is a light colored skin that goes well with the exterior leather colors and reflects more light so you can see deep into the bag easily.
• Leather Colors: We chose three of the six colors considered the most sophisticated colors in the world, and based them off of which exact color they will age to. Each of the colors is close to the color natural leather will age through if used a lot. Natural, dark reddish brown, then black. All of our leathers will darken some except black.
  
  These colors were chosen to specifically match this specific refined design style. A brown Ferrari or a red Rolls Royce would be wrong. The color needs to fit the style. We use the same boot leather and same colors as we chose for our World War 1 Officer’s Boot.
  
  Choose the colors appropriate for each of your different situations. One bag does not fit all.
  
  
  • Raven Black: Signals professionalism, formal classic taste, confidence, decisiveness, rebellious, power. Carry with black, dark gray and dark blue suits or attire.
  • Oxblood: Signals professionalism, classic taste, with a touch of sophistication and a flair of creativity and style. Carry with black, dark blue suits, dressed up jeans and clothing.
  • English Tan: Signals professional yet approachable, stylish, warmth, down to Earth, business casual and creative. Carry with light grays, browns and medium blues.

Other Considerations With Saddleback Classic and Silverback Designs That Make Them Look and Feel Right

• Thirds: A subtle design detail, not specific to refined designing, is designing in thirds. You will see 3 sections or 3 parts everywhere, and on the 1/3 lines, but not always. The right spacing is critical.
• Triangles: Man is drawn to triangles in nature, so you will see them with hardware and other features in all of my designs.
• The Right Weight of Design: When a part of the bag has shadows or layers, I visually balance it out by adding that same weight to the opposing side of the design.
• The Right Lines: Too many horizontal or vertical lines can ruin the look and just make it feel busy or hectic.
• The Right Silhouette: The height, width and depth of a design is so important if you want a standard classic look. And the pockets on it too. If you like boxy or hotdog bags, look elsewhere. Or hotdog legs.
• The Right Radius: To be consistent with the right curve on a corner, relative to the size of the bag, is what separates the men from the boy designers.
• The Right Handles: Thickness, length, front to back placement and the precise size of the handle anchors matter to me.
• The Right Leather Look: Some designs look better in Matte or Eggshell and others in Semi-gloss or Gloss.
• The Right Leather Texture: Smooth, Roughed up, Slightly Marbled or Pebbled are just four of the options available, but all of them send a specific message.
• The Right Leather Hand: Stiff, firm, soft or ragdoll floppy depends on the purpose for the design.
• The Right Hardware Size: We have four sizes of buckles and three sizes of d-rings. Each has to be proportionate to the size of the bag or case. I hope you like my judgment.
• The Right Seams: A crested seam sticking out along the edges or an overlapping seam with a double stitch in the middle, are the two I have chosen for this look. There are other good seams, but these two seem, to me, are the best for the specific look we are going after.
• Simplicity: I rarely design with more than 3 colors, which includes the color of the shiny hardware. Too many colors usually seems to me, lazy designing or an amateur move.
• The Right Functionality: If you never think about the size, ease of use and flexibility of the pockets; if you never consider the comfort or length of handles or shoulder strap and pad. If the feel of the bag against your hip or leg never comes to mind, then I have done my job.

Design Considerations For The Construction To Support The 100 Year Warranty

A quality design isn’t quality if it isn’t designed to last. That comes from decades of seeing what holds up and what doesn’t on our designs. We’ve had to make a lot of small repairs over the years to honor our 100 year warranty, because of unforeseen design weaknesses in the design. We evaluate it and then make the design or construction change so it doesn’t happen again.

We consider the following:

• Hidden reinforcements: Polyester straps hidden inside stress points
• Double and triple stitching: Perpendicular to the direction of the pulling action
• Double materials: To reinforce and stop stretching
• Cutting leather: Leather below the ribs of the cow is stretchier than leather along the spine. So, we cut certain pieces of leather from particular areas of the hide according to the stress that piece receives.
• Handle placement: Further down the bag so weight pulls the handle parallel to the bag instead of perpendicular to the bag.

You’re buying a design

• 18” Duffle Bag
  • 2 people 2 to 3 nights or one person 4 days
• 20” Duffle Bag with Deep Pockets
  • 2 people 3 to 4 nights or one person all week
• Barristers Briefcase
  • Holds two red 4” legal binders
• 17” Plain Clean Briefcase
• 16” Thin Executive Briefcase

A quality design starts in the design room.

You’re not just buying a bag, you’re buying the decades of mistakes and learning and understanding and experience to put together a really great collection, according to a very specific style. And you’re buying my own spin on design preferences. So, if you are like me, you like things a little more natural and masculine. Like Indiana Jones or James Bond would carry, but a James Bond that bleeds.

Cicero’s Treatise on Old Age.

You’re buying design and leather experience, knowledge and understanding.

I’m not a GREAT designer because I’m really slow and don’t always make the right choices, but like anybody who does something for decades, I’ve learned a lot through the hundreds of mistakes and also the successes. I pay attention to design. It is a big part of my life.

You’re buying construction experience for durability

Leather stretches, thread gets stress and leather can get holes from constant pressure.

• The right support for the handles so leather doesn’t stretch below it
• The right seams to look nice and keep the bag’s shape
• The right reinforcements in the right places to stop stress from occurring or make the stress points strong.
• The right joints to make sure functionality doesn’t degrade
• The right bottom to make sure the bag doesn’t start to look dumb.
• The right internal design to not stretch or deform from the inside
• The right support for durability
• The right stitching: The right size needle holes for the thickness of the thread, and that is sometimes determined by the thickness of the leather.

You’re buying craftsmanship experience for a quality appearance

• Cutting experience to cut from the right places
• Sewing experience - It takes 8 months of training for our stitchers to start to get good
• Expensive machines we invested in to get the quality stitching
• Edge painting experience
• Fine details

How The Silverback Was Conceived

Designed For Silverbacks, Not For Chimps

In 1999, living in southern Mexico, I asked myself, “What would Indiana Jones carry?” and then designed a bag like what I imagined in my head.and called it Saddleback. That same year, I chose my first email address, [email protected]. 

In 2010, I asked myself, “What would James Bond carry? and called it Silverback. But not just any James Bond. I wanted a James Bond that bleeds. And I’ve been trying to understand exactly what that would be like ever since. Strong yet refined. Classy yet masculine. I imagined someone carrying my classic looking timeless bag, wearing a fine bespoke suit from Savile Row, but with a bloodied face and busted up knuckles.

In 2010, we visited Africa New Life Ministries in Rwanda to understand more of what was going on with the money Saddleback had been supporting them with. While there, we trekked on the edge of the Congo in hopes of catching a glimpse of the rare Mountain Gorillas, and oh, did we ever.

That was when I learned what a Silverback was. As a gorilla matures, the hair on its back grows silvery, just like some of you. When you see a Silverback, you know it is the most powerful and dominant, the wisest and most respected of all of the male gorillas. It has matured and the whole family depends on it for protection and to lead them for provision. And that is when I decided we needed to have a Silverback Collection at Saddleback, for the Silverbacks of the world.

How The Silverback Was Understood

I wanted the refined and distinguished gentleman’s look, but what I was coming up with in the design room looked just like everything else on the market. It was pretty good, but I wanted great, and I was stuck. I couldn’t figure out how my bags could stand apart. What I began to learn was, it wasn’t just the silhouette of the bag that would differentiate it. It was the sum of all of the small 1% individual design details that would ultimately set the bag apart and give it that refined, sleek and sophisticated look.

In 2015, on the way back from a family business trip to the Sahara, along the border of Algeria, we took a long layover in Amsterdam, rented a car and I drove the wife and kids to England, the land of my ancestors. That was when my eyes and heart were opened to what I had been missing. I was inspired by the finer design details and feel of my classy and refined motherland. I paid close attention to all of the architecture, the history and the style of the people

Over the next 6 years, I immersed myself in class every chance I got. I shopped all of Bond Street and all of the other London stores of consequence on three different trips. I browsed the finest shops of Italy and the acclaimed stores of New York to confirm what I was drawn to and what I wasn’t.

And, part of defining what you like is understanding what you don’t like. The more I saw and experienced and held in my hands, the more I realized there wasn’t much for sale at all that I would personally want to own myself. Besides the gorgeous historical cases and bags in the antique stores in London, Swaine was the only store I found that still built gentlemanly and distinguished cases, but they did not bleed with strength and character. They were too “nice” for my taste.

Unsurprisingly, Swaine, Adeney, Brigg had made the black leather attaché case that was standard issue for James Bond and all other 00 agents carried in the movie From Russia with Love. It carried 20 rounds of ammo, flat throwing knives, a .25 calibre AR7 folding rifle, 50 hidden gold sovereigns and a tear gas cartridge hidden in a talcum powder tin. The case was booby trapped if not opened correctly so the tear gas would explode.

The rest of the designs I found looked too casual or neutered, like they were knocked out by recent design school graduates. They were well thought through, but were young designs. They designed them for dudes, like themselves, just out of college, not for the mature, powerful and highly respected of our society. They didn’t have the life experience nor understanding yet. They were soft and lightweight “my first big boy job” bags, not an impressive and strong briefcase for a scarred and seasoned man to carry into a boardroom or into the House of Lords. They were designed for chimps, not Silverbacks.

How The Silverback Was Designed

Okay, don’t roll your eyes. This may sound like I’m exaggerating, but I’m not. This is how I came up with the exact Silverback look and feel. Over the next 5 years, I spent hundreds of hours and tens of thousands of dollars observing, deliberating, questioning, buying and prototyping different concepts and looks.

• Respect, dignity, excellent work. Other than being a womanizing, calloused murderer, James Bond is a pretty good guy with a big heart in there somewhere. And he is very much respected.
• Intelligent, wise, experienced, capable, hard working and the most skilled in his work. And unsurprisingly, they all had the respect of everyone around them. Everyone wanted to be like them or be with them. They were one who could be depended on to get the job done. They were always a comfort to the team knowing they were there.

How The Silverback Was Conceived

I have walked hundreds of stores throughout London, Rome, New York trying to understand how it should look. constantly been observing, reading, prototyping and designing this Silverback Collection. I have walked all of the stores of consequence on Bond Street and throughout at least three times in London to understand.

Silverback Branding

Brand Feel - James Bond that bleeds

• Stately
• Professional
  • Board Room
  • Corner Office
  • Financial District
• Classy
• Fine
• Quality
• Refined
• Kingly
• Presidential
• James Bond
• Bond Street
• High Street
• Classical History
• Latin
• Greek
• Boardroom
• Fine Italian Quality
• Intellectual

Musical Instruments

• Violin
• Cello
• Clarinet
• Piano
• Symphony
• Classical Guitar

Transportation

• Classic English Cars
• Aston Martin
• Bentley
• Rolls Royce
• Jaguar
• Yacht
• Wooden Boat
  • Small Sailboat
  • Schooner
  • Sloop
• Range Rover
  • Offroad version - Classic Series 3 Land Rover or Range Rover

Colors

• Tan
• Dark Reddish / Burgundy Brown
• Dark Green
• Black
• Navy Blue

Clothing and Fashion Accessories

• Scarves
• Cuff Linksn
• Ascots
• Fountain Pens
• Wooden Umbrella
• Swiss watch
• Pocket Square handkerchief
• Bespoke Suit (Savile Row)
• John Lobb Shoes
• Collared Shirts
• Matching Belt
• Tie
• Slacks
• Tucked in Shirt
• Well put together
• Shinier
• Clean and simple
• Less Color
• Narrow
• Dark Trench coat
• Dark ¾ length coat
• Wool sweater
• Waist coats - Vests
• St. Barts

Geographical Location

• British
  • English cottage on the coast weekend home
  • Cliffs of Dover
  • Scotland
    • Highlands
    • Edinburough
  • Oxford Library
  • Cambridge Campus
  • British Museum
  • Royal Geographical Society
  • Natural History Museum
  • Trafalgar Square
  • National Gallery in London full of works of art
  • Downtown London
    • Bond Street
    • St. James Street
    • Downing Street
    • Big Ben and Parliament
    • Tower Bridge in London
    • Windsor Castle
• Northern Mediterrainian
  • Greece
    • Parthenon
    • Agora
    • Santorini
  • Monaco
• Swizterland
  • Zurich
  • Swiss Alps
• Austria
  • Vienna
  • Salzburg
    • Marionette Theatre
• France
  • Paris
  • French Riviera
  • French Alps
  • Arch de Triumph
  • Eiffel Tower
  • The Louvre in Paris
• Lighthouses
• Marinas
• Grassy hills with sheep

Decor

• Fine art
• Realistic Paintings
• Darker colors
• Vases
• Realistic Sculptures
• Bust of a classic character
• Dark green walls
• Dark wood
• Encyclopedia Leatherbound set in Library
• Newspapers
• Crown Molding
• Roman Mosaics of chariots
• Greek Mythology

Historical figures

• English
  • Winston Churchill
  • Sir William Blackstone
  • David Livingstone
  • C.H. Spurgeon
  • Hudson Taylor
• The Classics
  • Cicero (Roman)
  • Plato (Greek)
  • Socrates (Greek)
  • Caesars - Marcus Aurelius (Roman)

Brands

• Truefitt and Hill barbershop
• Fortnum and Mason
• Rolex
• Mont Blanc
• Rolls Royce
• Bentley
• Range Rover

Drinks

• Hot tea
• Espresso
• Wine

Sports and Hobbies

• Equestrian
• Sailing
• Flyfishing
• Pheasant Hunting
• Shooting
  • Over Under shotguns
• Chess
• Billiards
• Fencing

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