Customized CAS Hanwei Practical Single-Hand Sword

I'm still in the experimental phase so I went quick and dirty again. I'm more or less satisfied with the results of this project given the money and modest time investment. I'm almost ready to make a bit more serious attempt.
I stripped off the fake leather grip to reveal a hardwood handle with pronounced lathe work. Rather than rework the wood I decided to simply cover it. I measured and cut 2 oz leather to fit then soaked it in hot water for about 5 minutes. I did not skiv and overlap the leather so again the lacing looks a bit amateur, but it is mostly straight. I will be pre-dying and skiving all seams and gluing the leather down in the next few handle projects, and if I get another lathed handle like this I will rework or replace the wood.
While the grip leather was wet I wrapped the handle with cord and brought out the woodwork detail. After dying the details were hard to see, so I lightly weathered the grip with steel wood then applied gel antique. Finally I added two thin bands of lighter leather at both ends.
Rather than create a wood core scabbard from scratch I just wrapped the stock fiberglass scabbard in 4 oz leather, and left a small amount of the throat and chape exposed. Next time I will make a new wood core. I would have preferred 2 oz leather but the price of 4 oz was 1/3 the cost. I carefully measured the scabbard diameter at 6 inch intervals and cut a piece of leather with an extra 1/4 inch width. The leather was very stiff so I had to soak it in a pot of warm water for about 10 minutes before I could wrap it.
I glued on 2 mm cord risers and wrapped the leather. I stitched up the back and let it dry, then did an experiment and removed the leather, re-soaked it and added some simple leather tooling details. This worked OK though I may try to carefully measure the riser locations and do the tooling before applying the leather to the scabbard.
I dyed the 2mm leather cord a dark brown and restitched the back. Next time I will definitely skiv the leather and allow 3/8" of an inch overlap because the butted seam on the back looks a little amateur.
The suspension system will consist of two dark brown straps that run between each pair of risers.