Curriers, Skinners, and Tanners Guild

The cordwainers would have had nothing to work with if it weren't for skinners, tanners, and curriers. Skinners (who were not necessarily organized into specialized guilds in the Middle Ages) were the laborers who stripped the hides off cows and pigs, at which point tanners chemically treated the hides to turn them into leather (one popular medieval technique was to steep the hides in vats of urine, which ensured that tanners were relegated to the far fringes of towns). A step up in the guild hierarchy, at least in terms of status, cleanliness, and respectability, were curriers, who "cured" the leather supplied to them by tanners to make it flexible, strong, and waterproof, and also dyed it various colors to sell to the nobility.