Unleash the potential of your penumbra product
All penumbra enthusiasts already know that the story of this company began in my own bedroom. I wanted unique products for myself, in designs that I liked, and that was challenging to find. So, I decided to take matters into my own hands.
Back then, it wasn’t quite so simple because, as a young woman who had just started her own business as a seamstress and wanted to buy leather and hardware only in very small quantities for personal use, the selection of materials and accessories was quite limited. Likewise, access to specialized machines like a laser cutter was possible but cumbersome.
Now, more than 10 years later, things look pretty different. We have our own laser cutter in the workshop, we offer five different hardware colors, and the actual selection of possible color, material, and design combinations for just one collar is mind-boggling. (There are over 10 million. Seriously. At that point, I stopped counting because it seemed absurd.)
And because more than ten million possibilities to customize your penumbra product sounds like quite a challenge, also for you, we’ve put together a (not quite so) small overview of your customization options.
For those who prefer not to read the whole post, here’s a shortcut to each topic:
SIZE
Let’s start with the most straightforward decision: choosing the right size for your product.
For our customers’ favorite items, namely collars and cuffs, you can choose from various standard sizes to find what fits you best. Of course, you’re also free to have a personalized size made. This makes sense especially when your measurements don’t fit well into the size range we provide or are very close to the edge of a size range, and it’s important to you to have enough adjustment options in both directions.
We also offer some products that we always customize to your measurements. You’ll find a field where you can enter your measurements for those.
When you measure yourself, please always do so at the point where your penumbra product will sit later and measure directly on the skin; only then can we craft the right size for you. We’ve also written an article to help you take the correct measurements; find it here.
Some penumbra products, such as our leashes or connectors, are available in standard sizes or lengths.
BASE MATERIAL
One of the decisions with the most significant impact on the appearance of your penumbra product is the choice of base color. For exceptionally comfortable wear, our products are always made from two layers, one that lies against the skin and one that is visible on the outside and is created from the base material.
For that, you can choose from various options in genuine leather or vegan alternatives.
To make your decision easier and provide more information about each material, we’ve created a short information brochure for you – find it here.
Occasionally, we also have special edition leathers in our workshop, which are not found in the brochure and are marked as “limited edition” in the shop.
ACCENT COLORS
Another great way to customize is to add color accents. With colored lining or colored stitching, you can easily achieve a very special, unique design.
LINING
As described with the base material, our products consist of two layers. One lies directly against the skin; this layer is called the lining. In contrast to the stable base material, we use soft materials here to ensure an exceptionally comfortable feeling when worn.
By changing the lining color, you set a small accent because, from the outside, you only see the edges of the lining peeking out behind the base material. For products with thick padding, such as the wide cuffs, waist belts, or thigh cuffs, the colored edge on each side is about 5 mm wide, and for other products, it is about 1-2mm. Here are a few examples of how great it can look:
We’ve also put together a small brochure on our lining material and the available colors, which you can find here.
Occasionally, we also have special edition leathers in our workshop; these are not found in the brochure and are marked as “limited edition” in the shop.
HARDWARE
We use many different hardware components to create our products, but we don’t want to introduce them all here; we just like to focus on the two factors that significantly impact the appearance of your products.
At penumbra, you can choose from four different sizes for your collar ring.
We offer:
- 14 mm narrow, for a particularly subtle look. Material thickness is about 2mm
- 20 mm narrow, our standard ring. Material thickness is about 2mm
- 20 mm bold, if you want it more stable, but not too intrusive. Material thickness is about 3mm
- 27 mm wide, the “Big one,” if you want a bit more. Material thickness is about 4mm.
The diameters always refer to the neutral diameter, i.e., measured in the middle of the ring.
We’ve already talked about bringing color into your penumbra product. Another option is to decide on the right hardware color for you.
For most of our items, we offer five different color options to choose from:
- Silver
- Gold
- Rose gold
- Brass
- Black
This allows you to further customize your new favorite piece to your design wishes and achieve your very own look.
By the way: all our hardware components are nickel-free, so you don’t have to worry about allergies here.
ADD-ONS
You can also add various add-ons to our items, especially the collars, to better suit your needs.
Here’s a brief overview of the options you can select in our shop.
PADDING
If you want extra soft, you can upgrade to additional padding for our collars.
What we do here is add a thin layer of special felt between the base material and the lining. This makes the material a little thicker but hardly noticeable. Here, you can see two bands, one with and one without padding.
This makes the collar a bit padded at the sensitive points of the neck, namely the front and sides, while remaining the same at the back of the neck where the closure is located, as we don’t want the strap to be thicker there – that would reduce comfort rather than improve it.
We often get asked if this really provides more comfort. The answer to that is very individual.
Suppose our customers have a very sensitive neck. In that case, they find the additional padding very pleasant as it provides a little extra cushioning zone. If one is rather insensitive or prefers the feeling of a smooth, rather unyielding material, one is better off without padding. In any case, you have our soft lining directly against your skin, whether you opt for additional padding or not.
D-RING IN THE BACK
One ring in the front isn’t enough for you? No problem! We can also attach an additional D-ring to the back of the neck. That way, you can freely decide whether a leash or other attachment should be hooked to the front or back of the collar.
LOCKING BUCKLES
For some of our products, we offer the option to make them with lockable buckles. Here, we use buckles with an eyelet at the pin through which a lock can be inserted (but it doesn’t have to; you can also use the buckle like a regular one) so that the band itself cannot be removed independently.
These buckles are a bit larger due to their special design, so we recommend the classic buckle if you’re looking for something delicate. If you like the idea of the additional control factor, you’re in the right place with this option.
In the pictures is a comparison of a classic buckle and a lockable buckle.
Unfortunately, we can’t offer this closure variant for all our collars and cuffs. As soon as lace or fabric is involved, it doesn’t work anymore because the material would fray immediately.
The collars of the “leather and lace” and “delicate” collections and the wide cuffs, waist belt, and thigh cuffs of the “delicate” collection cannot be combined with lockable buckles.
ENGRAVINGS
A beautiful way to add a personal touch to your penumbra collar is through outside or inside engravings.
You can choose from our standard fonts, have a completely personalized calligraphy created, or send us your own design.
OUTSIDE ENGRAVING
We place the outside engraving on the collar’s side, usually on the side where the buckle is located (from the wearer’s perspective, on the right).
The engraving stands out on a black background due to the engraved area’s different textures. In contrast, on colored material, the engraving is darker than the material and therefore stands out more.
Congratulations
if you’ve made it this far! That was quite a bit of information, even though we tried to keep it as straightforward as possible.
If you want to delve into even more detail, feel free to download our catalog and browse it.
Do you have any questions or suggestions? Write us an email at office@penumbra.at. We’re always happy to create custom pieces for you or search for unique materials according to your wishes.