Custom Seat Maker Duane Ballard

Have you ever wondered who makes some of the seats you see on those fantastic high dollar bikes on the Discovery Channels Biker Build Off series? It must be some factory in Southern California, you're thinking. A huge conglomerate with dozens of employees in an assembly line set-up perhaps with a vast show room? No way, Jose.

Welcome to the wonderful world of Duane Ballard Custom Leather, Seat Maker to the Stars. We recently took a ride to the wilds of New Ipswich, New Hampshire to see just where and how these beautiful one-off seats were created. Duane is building a seat for a Triumph Bobber project that we're putting together to sell for a charity benefit and he graciously invited us up to his shop to see it in progress.

We arrived expecting to see a glitzy shop and show room, but we were pleasantly surprised to find Duane hard at work tooling the seat for our “Von Zipper” in a converted upstairs bedroom in the home he shares with his wife and two kids. More like a Parisian artist's garret, the room is small but cozy. Headroom is at a premium due to being at the top of an A-framed part of the house. Blaring Punk Rock music rocks the rafters as Duane pounded away at the leather with hand tools and a rawhide mallet. Real Old Skool hand-work. No fancy machines or assembly line work here. Every seat is a labor of love to Duane and he devotes around 20 intense hours of work embossing the design by hand onto each seat. Time will vary depending on the complexity of the design.

A native of Miami, Florida, Duane and his family moved to Arizona when he was five years old and then to New Hampshire about seven years ago.

Duane’s mom taught him and his two brothers the art of working with leather when they were just kids to keep them occupied. Being a crafter herself, she supplemented the family income with her leather work. It became a life long hobby for Duane, along with his passion for building model cars and anything Ed Roth, especially the Rat Fink that he has tattooed in a few places.

Along the way, he designed and built seats for friends but never entertained the notion of this turning into a fulltime career. Fate took a hand when Duane came home one night from a boring day job and found a message on his answering machine from bike and hot rod builder Hank Young. Hank had seen one of the seats Duane crafted for a friend on the HORSE Mag's Back Talk board and wanted Duane to do one for the Easy Money bike he was doing.

Well, after that, Paul Yaffee saw Hanks seat and commissioned Duane to do one for his B.B.O. bike as well, after having Duane make seats for four of his customer's bikes. That led to more work from Hank Young (4 seats to date). Dave Perewitz also had to have one, Warren Lane needed one for his Fist Full of Dollars bike and The Detroit Brothers needed Duane's talent for their Goat Bike.

Duane decided to chuck his day job and concentrate on making seats full time. “It's sweet when you can finally make a living doing something you love,” Duane said. When we were at his shop, he had just completed a seat for Greg Westbury in California that will be on the bike that will go up against Fuller Hot Rods of Georgia in a Biker Build off episode culminating at Hartford Conn. in January. He’s also going to be the man behind the seat for the Assalt Weapan for Bikernet’s Bonneville 2007 Effort.

With all the TV fame, Duane remains grounded. He still does seats for us little guys at damned reasonable prices. For just a little more than you'd pay for a factory made Le Pera seat, Duane Ballard Custom Leather can make you a one-off seat that you'll want to hang onto forever.

Will you make a seat for me Duane?–Coral

After you spend all the time and money to get your ride just the way you want it, an individual expression of yourself, don't you think you owe it to yourself to go the extra mile to have a seat that's truly your own and not just another factory clone?