Things You'll Need
Craft knife
Cutting mat
Leather needle
Leather sewing sinew
Thimble
Needle-nosed pliers
Mink is some of the softest and most luxurious fur that you can find, but because minks are so small, mink garments must be made by sewing together multiple pelt pieces. Like any fur, mink is challenging to sew, due to both the thickness of the leather hide and the difficulty in arranging the fur. Use mindful cutting and stitching techniques for the best results with your mink project.
Step 1
Lay the fur with the hair side down and skin side up on the cutting mat. Trace the pattern shapes with chalk. Cut the pattern shapes using the craft knife; monitor the depth of the blade as you cut to avoid cutting too much into the hair.
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Step 2
Pin the fur pieces together with sewing pins.
Step 3
Thread the needle with leather sewing sinew. Knot the end of the sinew to keep it from sliding through the leather when you sew.
Step 4
Part the hairs with your first and second fingers and lay them down to the side of the part at the point where you first insert your needle. Do this with every stitch that you insert into the hair side of the fur to keep the thread loop snagging as little hair as possible.
Step 5
Insert the needle point into the fur leather while gripping it with your fingers. If the leather proves too tough to sew with your hands alone, try pushing the needle with a metal thimble. If this fails, grip the needle with needle-nosed pliers 1/2 inch below the point and guide them through the leather this way; exercise caution because it's easy to accidentally bend and break the needle while gripping it this way.
Step 6
Sew with the smallest stitches you can; not only will this make the seam more secure, short stitches mean less hairs being flattened down against the skin.
Step 7
Watch the fur hairs as you sew. If they start to get bunched near a stitch you've just made, use the tip of the darning needle to carefully pull the hairs free.
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