Sleeves for English leathers are designed to slide down over the buckle of the stirrup leather. Colin Dangaard recommends fitting English leathers to stirrups in this way: he puts the buckle down at the bottom of the stirrup. This eliminates the bulk of the buckle that is created with how English leathers have been fitted to English saddles for about 300 hundred years. The traditional method has always been to put the buckle up against the stirrup suspension bar, which creates a buckle when the flap of the saddle falls over the bar. The traditional method also means the unused leather must be folded back down across the outside of flap and slid into a small keeper under the thigh of the rider, creating more bulk between the rider’s leather and the flap of the saddle. Colin likes to slip the end of the leather (the billet point ) back through the buckle after the desired hole has been engaged, and then the unused leather is slid up between the leathers. It is important to have the buckle hanging on the inside, against the horse. The sleeve is then pulled down over the buckle and pulled right to the top of the stirrup. When the rider puts his or her foot in the stirrup, and turns toes up the trail, the buckle is in front of the shin, not against the shin.