If the name Jing Magsaysay rings a bell, it’s because the guy used to grace television sets nationwide as reporter for ABS-CBN News. He later got the post of news anchor, and as managing director helped launch ANC, the ABS-CBN News Channel, in 1999.
Magsaysay left the Kapamilya fold in 2005 and did consultancy work before starting Solar News in 2010, which eventually became the local CNN. After 2015, he started out his media company, Lahi.PH, which focused on society and culture. Recently, however, the veteran journalist is becoming more known for something totally unrelated to news and media: making leather bags.
Magsaysay’s creations are not your ordinary leather bags. Because while the designs are quite simple—they have no compartments, no accessories other than buckles and rivets—they are built to last. Or to put it in Magsaysay’s words, they’re bags “that would be ready for life, no matter what life you live, no matter how rough that life may be.” Which is why he decided to call it “LifeLeather.”
How did his love affair with leather bags begin?
He says he’s been a tinkerer for as long as he can remember. “Since I was young, I would take apart electric fans and use the tools at home. I have a lot of tools for various things,” the ex-news anchor offers. “I've always been interested about how things are made.” One time, he made spear guns. Another time, he experimented with catapults that threw stones. He made slingshots, too—the kind David might have used against Goliath.
The curious boy grew up to become the ultimate handyman at home. “I do light switches. I paint the house. I was into carpentry for a while—I made wooden cabinets,” he tells us. “Every weekend when I had spare time, I would be under the cars or around the cars, doing something—whether it's cleaning a carburetor or changing shock absorbers or taking apart a rear axle.”
Magsaysay was in college when he first got himself a leather bag, which was actually his father Jose P. Magsaysay’s camera bag. He took out the camera and got the bag for his own personal use. “I liked it because the leather was nice. It had two compartments and I used it almost every day. I felt a little weird because I was the only guy that brought around a bag,” says the UP Fine Arts grad, laughing at the recollection. “Nobody used bags at the time. But I just felt good using the bag.”
Magsaysay started buying leather bags from the time he could afford them. He’s not brand conscious, he says, but is very particular about how bags are made. He’s had bags made in Italy, from Thailand, one by a local bagmaker from Cebu. He was into other kinds of bags too, mostly waxed canvas with leather, like the ones by American brand Filson. “I choose bags depending on how I think they could be of service to me, because for me a bag is a tool, a tool to help you do something.”
A couple of years ago, the journalist thought, “Why don't I make a bag that I have always wanted?” By that, he meant one that’s real tough—because he always brings with him a lot of stuff—and one that will last a long time. “I didn’t want to change bags every year just because they couldn't stand up to the way I use them,” he says.
Looking back, Magsaysay has always been curious about bagmaking. “Since I used my first leather bag, the one from my father, I looked at all the details of the bag. The stitching, the cuts, the characteristics of the leather. I would imagine how the bag was made, what tools were used,” he says. Then two years ago, he picked up a leathercrafting books by Al Stohlman and watched how other craftsmen make bags on YouTube.
Since he had no experience, he initially bought cheap tools and leather to practice on. After familiarizing himself with the leather, he started designing and crafting his own bags. “My first creations were bad simply because I didn't know how to deal with leather,” he admits. “Leather is like a living thing, it moves while you're handling it. Different leathers have different textures and they have different characteristics. You have to learn leather first and the way it behaves before you could create something out of it.”
The first bag he made was a crossbody bag—nine inches wide, seven inches tall, and around two and a half to three inches across when opened, with an adjustable strap. What’s unique about it? It’s stitchless. “I know a lot of people will disagree, but I personally feel that sometimes stitches can be a weak point,” he says, mentioning a popular bag that he owns but could no longer use because the strap came apart.
Instead of stitching, he uses rivets to fuse the bag together as they are “permanent and very strong.” The load-bearing areas of the bag get double riveted. The entire body is a singular piece of leather. The reason the design for his first bag took long to finalize, he says, is “because the leather weaves itself into my design.”
He changed the design and dimensions several times until he arrived at what he felt were the correct configurations. When he finished the bag, he still didn’t like it. So he tried a different kind of leather and that’s when finally he came out with a prototype.
He made several more prototypes and when he finally came up with something he was really proud about, he was so thrilled he posted a picture of it on Facebook. His cousin, the restaurateur Elbert Cuenca, saw it and liked it, and so Magsaysay offered to give it to him. But Cuenca insisted to pay. “Something as nice as this should have a value to it,” Cuenca told him. And that became the first bag he sold.
He made more bags after that, posted them on social media, and people started inquiring about them. This was the beginning of LifeLeather.
Currently, the journalist-turned-bagmaker only makes three types of bags. One is a crossbody that’s nine inches wide, seven inches tall, and 2.5 inches wide across. He calls it “The Everyday” because it's meant for daily use and can fit everyday things: wallet, phone, charger, what-have-yous.
The second bag is a satchel or leather briefcase. It can fit a 13- or 14-inch Macbook, A-4 folders, and other personal effects. Magsaysay calls it the “Heirloom Satchel” because “it will last you a lifetime.”
The third bag is a leather tote designed for everyday but for heavier stuff.
Magsaysay’s bags are genderless. “I just designed bags that I thought everyone could use…that I think would work,” he says. After getting inquiries from both male and female clients over the past months, he realized his designs are gender neutral. “It's actually for everyone, and for everyone's lifestyle. No matter what lifestyle that is.”
LifeLeather bags are made of full-grain leather, which means the entire hide or skin is used, and these are about 2.5 mm to 3 mm thick. It’s the kind of leather often used for boots and belts. Magsaysay chooses them hide by hide. His bags come in brown, black and flesh. He gets his leather from importers in Marikina. “Most of my leather comes from outside of the Philippines simply because there's very little leather production in the Philippines,” he says.
The bags are made to order and, at the moment, Magsaysay is the only one who makes them. To ensure the quality, he only makes one bag a day. He has a small place in Tagaytay where he keeps a workshop. “That's where I make the bags, because the weather's really nice there,” he says.
Magsaysay says a bag’s leather and hardware acquire a patina over time. “They age gracefully. It becomes the way you use it. It becomes you,” he wrote on LifeLeather’s Facebook page. He uses only seamless solid brass, copper and stainless steel. “All my designs are my own: stitchless, hand cut, hand finished.”
To order, visit LifeLeather’s Facebook or Instagram accounts. Right now, there’s a four-week wait. “Whenever I'm making a bag, I’m thinking about the person that ordered that bag,” he says. “So it's really a personal connection between the bag and me, the bag and the person, and the person and me.”
Photos courtesy of Jing Magsaysay