When you get a Makoto Street Wand, you're getting a wand that is handmade from a single piece of ultra-dense ironwood. The species I select share exceptional qualities-- they are tough, sink in water, and have high resin content, allowing for smooth polishing. Being wood, they will patina over time, but you can take a couple simple steps to keep it smooth and shiny for as long as possible.
Your wand care begins with how you use it. As strong as ironwood is, it can only handle so much abuse. Tapping cups, table legs, or coins is fine, but bouncing the wand off of concrete sidewalks, or scraping it on the ground can wear it out. Use your common sense.
Avoid leaving your wand in a hot vehicle for an extended period of time. Depending on the specific wood, the resin and moisture may dry up, which may lead to warping.

To polish your wand and make it look shiny and smooth, use liquid beeswax and super fine #0000 steel wool. Evenly spread a thin layer on the wand. It takes very little to cover a whole street wand, just a few drops. Give it ten minutes to dry, then polish it smooth with the steel wool. Polish it until you are satisfied. It can reach close to a mirror polish.

Note: This process is not recommended for all magic wands. Many wands on the market are covered in lacquer or paint, which would not take the wax, and get scraped off by the steel wool. The ironwoods used for Makoto Street Wands are specifically capable of a beautiful natural polish.

Many street magicians use the gibeciere, or buskers pouch, when performing. It's a useful accessory for cups and balls, coin magic, and manipulations. Pioneered extensively by Jim Cellini, the busker's pouch has regained popularity among magicians. I have been using a pouch for well over twelve years.

Most pouches are made of leather. In general, leather is durable, pliable, and stylish enough to look good with a magician's costume. The leather quality can vary greatly between manufacturers, though. On the low end are thin bovine upholstery leather bags, factory made by machines. Higher tier gibecieres have been made by hand out of exotic, durable leathers. Regardless of their origins, all these leathers require conditioning and care.

If you can figure out the specific leather of your buskers pouch, a quick search online for specific care should be educational.

In general, you will want to clean, condition, and protect your gibeciere. You don't need much for it. Some scrap fabric like old clothes, a horsehair brush, some conditioner like Bick 4, and a waterproofing spray like Saphir Super Invulner or Collonil Waterstop will help keep your pouch looking and being its best.

A few times a year, wipe your pouch down with a damp cloth to clean it. Don't let the leather get too wet, though.
Once the leather is dry, use a cloth to apply the Bick 4 to the pouch, applying it evenly like you're moisturizing your own skin with lotion.
After a couple minutes, when the conditioner has been absorbed by the leather, brush the leather with the horse hair brush. This step is optional, but can help give your pouch a shine.
Finally, spray your gibeciere with Super Invulner or Collonil Waterstop. Follow the directions on the packaging. This will weatherproof your pouch, in case you get caught in the rain with it.

Congratulations, if you've followed the simple steps to pouch care, your gibeciere should have extra years of use on the pitch.

Note: more exotic leathers like Stingray, Shell Cordovan, Ostrich, or Pachyderms require more specific products and care.

If you enjoyed this article, please share it with a magician who uses leather bags,

What did legendary Street Magician Jim Cellini steal when he wrote his memoir/manual titled "Dreamer's Highway"?

  In the tradition of book publishing, following in the footsteps of S.W. Erdnase, Cellini borrowed major ideas and large blocks of copy from earlier books. As a door to door salesman in his youth, Cellini had evidently been well trained in sales and motivation.

 A classic text on self-help and entrepreneurship is Napoleon Hill's "Think and Grow Rich." Hill ostensibly derived wisdom about wealth building by studying the business leaders of his time.

In the introduction to "Think and Grow Rich," Hill teases the reader by stating that the book contains a valuable secret, hidden in plain sight, and repeated several times. He encourages the reader to celebrate their epiphany once they recognize it. Cellini's "Dreamer's Highway" contains the exact same hook in the introduction. Throughout the text, one of Hill's famous quotes is rephrased and reiterated in several ways. 

According to one of his stories, Cellini used the quote as an answer when people asked him whether his lignum vitae magic wand had real powers. "What the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve." The OG Professor of Magic, Harlan Tarbell, wrote about magic being the power of the mind to change reality. Cellini extended that philosophy by reminding us that The Wand is the means by which Mind affects Reality-- the real power of Magic. 

I've met some wizards in my life. I'm sure you have, too. They are fountains of knowledge, perspective, and skills. Spending a few minutes in their presence provides insights that can change the course of your life. Danny Sylvester (the Jester) and Tom Frank have had that kind of impact on me in my twenties. They continue to inform my understanding of magic and the human condition.
"Wizard" derives, boringly enough, from the same root as "wise." Nothing to do with street wands or gibecieres.
However there is a fun fact about the word, that is, to my understanding, coincidental.  It is a numerical mirror of itself in the alphabet.
Consider that the letters A and Z are both one letter away from being away from either end of the aphabet. B and Y are both two letters away from the end. C and X are three letters away, etc.
The word "wizard" consists of two halves that mirror each other, under such a pattern. Specifically, "4 9 1 1 9 4."
"W"  and "D" are both four letters away from either ends of the alphabet. "I" and "R" are both nine letters away. "Z" and "A" are the end and beginning of the alphabet.
abc d efgh i jklmnopq r stuvwxy z
zyx w vuts r eponmlkj i hgfedcb a
wizard
draziw

Actually becoming a wizard might involve forgetting trivia like this and learning something useful

Choosing a wand to represent your magic while being fully functional and performance ready requires consideration of several factors. Design, size, and color influence what magic a wand can do. For example, the best wand for Ring on Wand may not be suitable for the Striking Vanish.

Design:
    Design refers to the material and shape of the wand, or whether the wand screws together in the center like a pool cue, is made in one piece, or has contrasting “tips”.
    Throughout history, magic wands have been made of ivory, bones, woods, plastics, and metals. They’ve been covered with tape and leather, embedded with gems, capped with bullet casings, and scorched with electricity. For cups and balls magicians who need a heavy durable wand that doesn’t damage cups, a good wooden wand is best for longevity.
    Many occult or “Harry Potter”-style wands have distinct handles and tips. Like the scepter or club, the precursors to wands, the shafts often taper. They have elements of the mysterious, exotic, and shamanic, and can feel more “real” than a conjurer’s straighter rod, but do not work well with much magic involving sleight of hand with the wand itself. A balanced, symmetrical baton style wand is the easiest to work with for the street magician.
    Two piece wands feel classy and provide time for exposition while they’re being screwed together. For special shows, they are beautiful and artistic. Screwing together at the center has downsides, however. The joint is necessarily weak, so such wands can’t be used as a “thumper”— to make noise by tapping it on the ground or table to draw attention. The ability to come apart also makes magic involving solid through solid, like the ring on wand, less impossible.
    Wand tips— making the last two inches or so on one or both ends of a wand different from the shaft— are iconic and easily recognizable. Occult wands have been made with contrasting colors, crystals, metals, and lodestones to represent polarity. The classic modern tips are the white ends on a black shaft. Many wands sold on the market go for this look. They do so in 3 ways: capping the ends, joining the ends, or engraving. Metal capped ends have the same issue as solid metal wands— they damage cups upon impact. Tips that are glued or screwed on have the same compromised durability as two-piece wands. Distinct tips allow for the possibility for gimmicks, however. The Tarbell Course, Lesson 21 describes many prepared wands using tips. Some single-piece wands imply tips with engravings. They look nice and are as durable as plain street wands.

Size:
    Magic wands vary in size from the comic extremes of a couple inches to large enough to cross a small stage, for children’s comedy acts. For performing most street magic, the popular length ranges from 8-14 inches, with a thickness of 3/8”-3/4”.
    The ideal size wand for street magic is about 11-12”x1/2”. For most people, this is just long enough for flipstick while being as long as possible. Much longer and the end of the wand will flash. 1/2” is thick enough to be durable, while being thin enough for most finger rings to slip over. Most hardwoods at this size are heavy enough for wand spinning moves.
    For strolling magic, shorter wands ranging from 6-10” long are also popular, since they can fit in a variety of pockets more easily. Spinning moves become more challenging with shorter wands, but they’re better for sleights along the lines of David Williamson’s striking vanish.

Color:
    Wands are available in all colors. There are even transparent wands. Wands can also be shiny or dull. For practical consideration, we can categorize them as flashy or subdued.
    Flashy wands have brighter colors and/or shiny finishes. A white metallic wand, for example, would be flashy. For our purposes, even if only the tips are flashy, e.g. white tips on a black wand, the wand will be considered flashy.
    Subdued wands are the opposite. Darker colors with matte or no finish. Many wands are painted or anodized black, or are made of ebonies.
    There are tricks that benefit from either a flashy or subdued wand. The striking vanish, wand spin, any sort of levitation or suspension or the wand itself, for example, benefit from the wand being clearly visible. Subdued wands are better for flip stick work and its variations, where the wand itself is being hidden. A flashy wand can leave a visual streak as it vanishes, whereas a subdued wand might seem to pop out of existence.