American Bench Craft

Necessity, some wise personage once ventured, is the mother of invention. No one knows for certain who first spoke (or wrote) these words, though some attribute the phrase to Plato. It doesn’t matter, really, whether the stone-chiseled maxim was voiced by the Athenian philosopher or by George Washington or…Groucho Marx. It hangs in there. It endures. And after talking to dozens of makers all over the country who found their way to the medium of leather, I am as convinced of its veracity as I am that the sun sets in the West.

It’s sure as heck true for brothers Jason and Chris Angelini, who handcraft everything from wallets to belts, bracelets, hatchet holsters, hammer holders and much, much more at their company, American Bench Craft, in Wilmington, Massachusetts. Like so many others, the brothers