Dr. Marisol Martinez, front, and Lance Anderson in the back create their custom leather products in their Altadena studio.
by Timothy Rutt
The road to California Bohemian Leather is one that involved lots of twists and turns.
When chiropractor/yoga instructor Marisol Martinez and podcaster/spoken word artist Lance Anderson opened their joint studio, Altadena Junction, at 2524 El Molino Ave., in 2009, it was with high hopes. The couple would each have their own piece of the studio: Martinez would run her chiropractic practice and teach yoga on one side, while Anderson would run his half as a performance space/gallery.
Two years later, they had to make some tough decisions: frequent filming in the neighborhood made it difficult to run a yoga practice. The performance space wasn't working as planned -- they couldn't move in enough people to make it profitable, Anderson said -- so it was turned into a gallery, and then nobody was buying the art. Evening arts events meant moving out the yoga and chiropractic furniture. They decided they needed to add another line of business.
According to Anderson, they were thinking about starting a T-shirt business, until a fortunate trip to Palm Springs and a visit to a local leather shop gave them inspiration.
Rich Bohemian leather
"We were always looking for belts and stuff that were really well-made," Martinez said. When she was growing up, "we had a family friend, and he was a leathersmith, so growing up, to me it was always fascinating -- and when I saw this stuff, it totally took me back."
And that was the inspiration for forming California Bohemian Leather. Anderson said he was a little reluctant to go into leatherworking at first, but "I had been a baseball player growing up. I loved baseball, I'd been repairing gloves ... that was the entry point for me. I was more resistant to leather stuff than she was."
"I really pushed it," Martinez said.
"... and I'm glad, the t-shirt thing would've been a dime a dozen thing," Anderson said.
Besides, the tools and supplies for working leather cost far less than what they'd require for a T-shirt business, Anderson said -- only a few hundred dollars as opposed to several thousand.
And they had a product they wanted to make: belts.
Finding the market
"We wanted to make a real sturdy belt with a real sturdy belt buckle, that was really riveted on, something really solid," Anderson said.
Anderson at his workbench assembling a custom belt.
And, Martinez said, "we really took it as an art form .. it's not just something you're going to wear, you're creating out of this hide. There's this raw material and you're creating something beautiful."
But it's not without some cost, Martinez said: " For me, it was really tough because I'm vegan." By making a beautiful belt out of an animal's hide, " I feel like you're trying to respect this thing."
So they started out making their first belts in the garage at the end of 2010, learning as they went. "We messed up a lot of leather," Martinez said. "We still do."
After some word-of-mouth purchases and sales through Etsy, a handmade goods website, they tried selling at the Altadena Urban Farmer's Market. That experience was "the thing that got us really cooking," Anderson said. "That was our first breakout thing. Those farmer's markets that we did allowed us to have a loyal customer base."
Moving, marketing, and marathons
As demand increased, so did production, but they were running into some problems. Leather reacts to its environment. In their uninsulated and open garage workshop, the leather responded to dry weather by drying out, and to wet weather by never letting the dyes dry.
So in the spring of 2011, they moved the leatherworking production to the performance space, where the environment could be controlled. Martinez continues to use her side of the shop for chiropractic massage, and private yoga sessions.
And they've begun to do some serious marketing of their product. Anderson, a sports fan, has developed a relationship with the Petros and Money sports talk show on KLAC, which has promoted their belts. And they're marketing to a select clientele: ultrarunners, people who compete in 100 mile races.
Martinez, who is an ultrarunner herself, said that runners in these races usually will get a belt buckle, a tradition stemming from the horse races these runs are derived from. "So there are all these runners that have buckles that don't have belts," Martinez says. California Bohemian Leather is advertising its custom belts to the ultrarunner market, so the runner has a sturdy, stylish belt that compliments the large buckle they earn in the race.
Martinez with two of the belt buckles she's earned in ultrarunning competition.
California Bohemian Leather is co-sponsoring the Chimera 100 mile Mountain Race in Orange County on Nov. 19, and is offering belts for the top male and female runners.
Their line also includes cuffs and guitar straps. The shop is open from 11 AM-3 PM Saturdays for special orders or to look at what's already on the rack.
Overall, Anderson says, "what's good about this has been a real compliment for us as a couple, in that there's certain things she's good at, and certain things I'm good at," pointing out that she's has an eye for design and color, and he's good at the hardware and "bulky stuff." "Either one of us can make a belt from zero," Anderson said. "It's better when we collaborate."
California Bohemian Leather
at Altadena Junction
2524 El Molino Ave.
(626) 818-4241
Open Sat., 11 AM-3 PM.
