Mid Atlantic Saddlery and Tack Repair

01/12/2025

01/09/2025

Excited for these to get here with our first saddles!

The first batch of our new saddle covers being embroidered at our partner in the UK. These will go onto the first couple of orders from our partner fitters and our first clients! The saddle covers are nylon with a fleece lining to keep your Defiant saddle safe, and clean.

01/04/2025

Looking forward to bringing a bunch of saddles and trees and information to Aiken to give a talk for a great cause! If you are going to be in Aiken for the first Tuesday in February, come and see me!

And if you want me to come and see your horses while I am in town send me a message and I will get you on the schedule. It is filling up fast!

Don't forget, sign ups are now open for the 2025 Aiken Equine Educational Series 🥳🥳🥳 This winter lecture series has been soooo popular, and completely SOLD OUT in 2024, so don't miss your chance to learn from top professionals in the industry! 2025 sessions will take place each Tuesday, 6:30 pm - 8:00 pm, Jan 14 - Feb 18 at 📆📆📆 $15 per session and 100% of the proceeds benefit the United States Eventing Association, Inc. (USEA) USEA Groom's Program ⭐️⭐️⭐️ Sign ups are live at: aikenhorsepark.org/equine-educational-series
🐴 01/14/2025 - Emma Ford - The Best Practices for Clipping
🐴 01/21/2025 - Kim Gentry "The Bit Lady" - Finding the right Bit and Bridle for your horse - sponsored by .eq
🐴 01/28/2025 - Dan Martzall CF - The importance of Healthy Feet & the art of a good Farrier
🐴 02/04/2025 - Lauren Garrett-Bond - Saddle Fitting, the relationship between performance and a good fit
🐴 02/11/2025 - Dr. Tyler Murray - Effective goal setting and managing focus and intention in the Saddle
🐴 02/18/2025 - Dr. Kate Echevarria - Best management practices for horse with EMS, IR, and Cushing's Disease
Want to help support this fabulous educational opportunity? There are still sponsorship opportunities available! All sponsors receive a 2025 WCG Aiken EES season pass and help fund the future of good horsemanship practices and skills! Sponsorship opportunities and their deliverables are available at: aikenhorsepark.org/equine-educational-series
More information on this fantastic program can be found at: aikenhorsepark.org/equine-educational-series
The 2025 World Class Grooming Aiken Equine Educational Series Media Coverage is provided by 🎥🎥🎥

01/02/2025

We have loved seeing everyone’s 2024 recaps, and while we have our own to post, we have more exciting things to share about 2025. So, without further ado: We are thrilled to announce the launching of our own line of saddles: Defiant Saddles.

As many of you already know, Lauren has spent the last 35+ years riding as a hobby after taking her first lesson when she was 7 years old. She grew up in a huge lesson barn and took a vested interest in learning everything she could about horse anatomy, movement and behavior. Once Lauren found her love of dressage, she had to search long and hard for saddles that worked for her as a rider and for her horses. Between blocks, seats, pommel heights, and flap length, she has often struggled to find the right set of variables to make her feel truly as one with the horse.

Professionally, over this same time, Lauren spent many years working with the fire service saving lives and patching up broken injuries. Her education in anatomy and physiology, and the world of injuries and movement gave her a rather unique perspective on the human body. Upon leaving the fire service, Lauren began her training as a bench saddler, and started dreaming up how she would configure saddles that would meet her own needs, and now the needs of her clients and their horses. Over the past few years, Lauren has been combining these experiences to bring you and your horse exceptional saddle fitting services. Understanding how saddles are made, and how those design features impact the horse and the rider, Lauren found a few places in the market that she felt she wanted to add options. And thus, Defiant Saddles was born.

The Defiant Saddles line will feature 5 unique saddles: The Maverick, The Elysian, The Apex, The Peregrine and The Palisade. The line will feature 2 different Dressage Models and 3 different Jump Models. The saddles have been designed by Lauren in consultation with a mentor Master Saddler in the UK with other 40 years of saddle making experience. Lauren has designed and customized the trees, selected materials, and finalized the designs and configuration of the saddles. They feature the most comfortable seat Lauren has ever sat in, and a variety of block options and flap configurations to meet the needs of all riders short, tall, thicc, skinny, etc. The saddles are hand crafted in Walsall UK, the saddle Capital of the world, and where Lauren has received her training. We currently have dressage demos available to try and expect to have jump demos in the coming months. All of our dressage demos come with a velcro flap so that customers can completely customize block shape and position. The delivered versions of these saddles will have the block integrated into the flap at the position of the clients choosing!

Key Features of the Saddle Line:

*Italian Calf Nappa leather (standard)
*Extra Padded Seats
*Extra Wide seat options for those who want more room under their seat bones
*Padded panels allowing for more comfortable leg positioning
*Customizable block options and positioning for the dressage saddles to include 4 different block shapes on two different flap shapes.
*Multiple Tree Options: Currently TB and CC (Warmblood and Adjustable trees in the coming months)
*Options for more forward, shorter or longer flaps.
*Seat sizes 16.0-19

We are so excited to be able to share these new saddles with our clients and their horses. While these are currently being made by a Master Saddler in the UK, our long-term goal is to bring production to the US and make this a true US brand with items as locally sourced as possible. We are working on training and recruiting saddlers here in the US to help us realize this shift in production.

For our saddle fitting friends, we are actively looking for saddle reps to carry our brands and will be offering exclusive territory for your areas. Defiant is a great compliment to the brands you already carry, or if you are a new fitter, we are happy to train you on how to best fit and service saddles to get you started on your journey. Please reach out to Matt for more details if you are interested! ([email protected])

01/01/2025

Happy Birthday to all our TB clients and friends! Most especially to our sweet kids Smash and Tiz!

12/21/2024

We made it! Don't give up, it is getting better!

We made it to the Winter Solstice. For us horsey people in the Northern Hemisphere the shortest day of the year, roll on lighter nights!

12/14/2024

Sometimes the only way to complete a project is to run away for a long weekend! We have ALOT in store for 2025 and we are super excited to share it all with you as they become available.

It has been an amazing 2024, we are so thankful for all of the clients and horses that we have been trusted to work with! Helping horses and their people is really our passion and we take the faith and trust you place in us as sacred. Looking forward to seeing you all again in 2025!

12/10/2024

If you are in Aiken in February come and see me! Look at some saddle trees, and panel configurations and learn about how to "read" a saddle and how to maintain your tack.

Sign up below!

12/09/2024

If you tag us, it will bring you extra luck! You could win an amazing Loxley saddle if you like the post!

COMPETITION NOW CLOSED!!

‼️ NOTE: BE AWARE OF SCAMS - we will NOT contact you in any form before 7th January (and only then if you have won) DO NOT click any links or messages that may refer to this competition.‼️

A lucky start to the New Year for someone……
**COMPETITION TIME – WIN A BLISS OR LOXLEY SADDLE** 🤞

We are giving one of our lucky fans the opportunity to WIN A BLISS OR LOXLEY SADDLE OF YOUR CHOICE!!!

To be in with the chance of winning all you have to do to is ‘Like’ our page and ‘Like’ the Post itself. It's that simple!!!
If you wish please also comment with the name of your favourite Saddle Fitter and their business name, the one with the most votes will also be winning a special prize from us too! We are unable to allocate votes to businesses alone with multiple fitters to make this fair!

Closing date, GMT12.00noon Monday 6th January 2025. This promotion is in no way sponsored, endorsed or administered by, or associated with, Facebook.
This is open to everyone all over the world and if you have a local Bliss saddle fitter we will arrange for this to be fitted as well.

For terms and conditions visit:
https://www.bliss-of-london.com/win-a-bliss-or-loxley-saddle-2025/

NOTE: BE AWARE OF SCAMS - we will NOT contact you in any form before 7th January (and only then if you have won) DO NOT click any links or messages that may refer to this competition.

11/29/2024

**Black Friday Demo Saddle Specials!**

We have several saddles that are coming out of our demo stock at discounted prices so we can refresh our saddle selections!

All saddles are price plus tax and shipping! If you see something you like and you want it, send a message and we will get payment and shipping details sorted, and get it on its way to you!

11/29/2024

Placing the order for these extension stirrups today.

They are $175 plus shipping and will be in from the shop next week.

Let me know if you need a set, and I will make sure I get enough in!
Foxhunters and trail riders especially, these can save you a lot of pain and heartache if you have to dismount in the field!

11/23/2024

Anyone else keep embarrassing photos of their kids? Someone really enjoyed her PEMF

11/21/2024

Sometimes you just have to take a break for Starbucks and baby cuddles.

11/21/2024

For all my foxhunters, and trial riders with taller horses. These are solution for mounting from the ground if you have to dismount in the middle of the field.
We can get a set ordered in for you in a matter of days.

11/20/2024

If you have ever had a fitting with me, you have heard me talk about the issues of shoulder freedom and thoracic sling. Here is a great online learning resources if you are a nerd like me and want to think more about how you train, how your horse moves, and how you are impacting their body and their comfort with your tack. Poorly fitted or poorly designed saddles are a horse welfare issue, and if you want top performance or 100% access to your horses potential, then well fitted and well designed tack is the only way to go.
If you haven't had a fitting with us, you should reach out and get on the schedule. We educate our clients about biomechanics, body postures, and tack interference on every fitting. We like science and data, and asking the horse their opinions as well as our riders.
We will be in Florida (wellington and Ocala) in January, in Aiken in early February, and available in our usual mid-atlantic states (MD/PA/DE/NJ) the rest of the winter.
Send us a message to get on the schedule!

11/19/2024

I was just talking about this on a fitting the other day. The angle at the back of the seat, and the size of the seat influence seat bone contact and position in the saddle.
If you don’t feel like you are centered, balanced, and able to get deep into your seat bones, you are probably in the wrong seat configuration.
And in dressage this matters, A LOT!
Reach out to get an assessment of your saddle, your position, and your choices that may better suit you!