Ecoferme Élevage d'animaux de ferme et compagnie / d'ornement en France

Our aim is to learn, practice and teach others Art & crafts.

This site is being created not only to show the craftsmanship of ecoferme members but that of like minded people with a passion of creating unique pieces of art, straight from mother nature.

The concept of Celtic path is to display to a world wide public that basses of the 4 element is important. Air, soil, air & water. Keeping all of these clean is also very important for the earth and every living thing on it , and yes that including us- mankind. These crafts therefore are made from basic raw produce of the earth and carefully selected products that are not toxic to the environment.

In today's modern way of living, lots of natural organic materials are wasted and discarded. Lots of others are scorned upon because of public common misunderstanding

Tanning

de-hairing - Eco ferme copyright 'all rights reserved'

skins/ hides of animals, that they had hunted for meat.

Tanning is a way of preserving a raw skin/hide and turning it into a soft piece of material that can be used in endless ways.

In the modern days of , " plastic throw aways" there is nothing to my mind more luxurious than a well tanned piece of leather or soft warm fur.

fur bed spread - Eco ferme copyright 'all rights reserved'

For people, like us who raises their own meat for the table or the hunter who shops in the wood rather than the super market, it is far better to turn the animals hide into a useful leather or fur item, which would otherwise, have been wasted.

There is many different ways of tanning, vegetable, chemical, oil and salts.

Like the Indians I believe each animal is special and if we do have to take an animal for meat, we should use all that mother nature offers, and not throw anything away.

Tanning is a labour intensive process guarantied to give you lots of blisters

Steps are:

fleshing - Eco ferme copyright 'all rights reserved'

Skinning the animal ( without making holes and on the right layer)
cooling
washing ( out stains, grease and dirt with soap and water)
Fleshing ( removing all the fat, meat, and unwanted membranes)
Tanning
Washing again ( to stop the tanning and freshen)
Drying ( flat drying or frame drying)
Stretching ( stretching the skin/hide to its limit as it drys)
Softening ( rubbing the leather side until even and soft)
Finishing ( brushing and fluffing up the fur/hair)

softening - Eco ferme copyright 'all rights reserved'

washing sheep skin - Eco ferme copyright 'all rights reserved'

Have a look on
Our online-store

for our tanned items for sale

NOTE: we do not believe in breeding or culling animals just for thier fur, hide or skin .

Tallow Candles

We made candles from the tallow of our livestock / Ouessant sheep horn with home made candle

Quills

Taxidermy

The art of taxidermy was very popular in the Victoria times but after the plumage laws in the 1920s it became less popular.

Taxidermy is an art requiring extensive knowledge of nature, animals structure and movement. It enable an animal that has past away to be re-created back to its own image once again. I became interested in this art after seeing many road casualty and wanting not to loose the beauty that the animal once had.

It is common knowledge that it is illegal to take any animal out of the wild to cull and taxidermy all wild species that are protected must have the correct paperwork and strict records kept.

Please note we do not believe in cull from the propose of taxidermy, we use only road-kills and animals that have died on natural curses.