Question about Aero A-2s and cowhide

[mulceber]

Aero's Battered Steer is amazing stuff. Handsome (one shade only, a subtly mottled seal), great feel, moves and flexes with the wearer. But I can understand if it's not what a civilian jacket buyer would want - meaning a cyclist. You'd never ride in it, because altho it's rugged, it's not thick or heavy. Just like you'd never ride in russet, because every dirt patch or oil stain would stand out.

See, that’s something that didn’t immediately click with me; when I initially thought of civilian jackets, I was thinking of people wearing ordinary everyday leather jackets that just don’t have a military association. It’s only when Ken brought it up that it occurred to me that Bikers would be such a huge demographic among civvy jacket wearers. In that light, it totally makes sense that lighter weights and lighter colors wouldn’t be as popular.

Really nice leather, btw - now I’m starting to drool over some of the battered steer jackets in the Quartermasters Issue...

Funny that. I have horses too, big heavy horses, and their reaction to some HH jackets has been somewhat odd. Obviously traces of original scent are eliminated in the tanning etc but one or two of the animals are just get a set of the head that is different when I have worn this or that jacket. Could be a correlation to the squeakiness of the garment, hadn't thought of that. Mind you their reaction to sheepskin / shearling is quite marked but I think you have to be a "horse" person to notice their subtle cues.

Obviously they are fine with leather tack and harness.

That's an interesting issue - yeah, I'm inclined to say it's the squeakiness of the leather, as I can't imagine that they'd be able to smell the original horse after all the chemicals involved in tanning...then maybe it's another kind of smell issue: you don't have your normal scent because of the strong leather smell of that jacket.

 

[blackrat2]

Steer is a great leather for sure, shows good grain etc and let’s be honest is hard to tell from horse