Awl pointed tool used to pierce material that is to be stitched or sewn. Awl comes in various size.
Hand-sewers use an awl to puncture a variety of materials or existing hole to enlarge. Awl use for sewing heavy materials like sole leather. It is a thin and tapered metal shaft, comes to a sharp pint. It can be either straight or slightly bent. The Shafts of awl are often in the form of interchangeable needles, usually have an eye piercing in it at the pointed end (as opposed to normal sewing needles) to aid in drawing thread through holes for the purpose of manual lockstitch sewing, in which case it is also called a sewing awl. Stitching awls are frequently used by shoemaker and other leatherworkers.
Welt sewing or sole stitching machines have an awl to make the hole that the thread is pulled through.
Awl is kind of dangerous tool. Louise Braile, French educator and inventor of a system of reading and writing for use by the blind or visually impaired, was gouged his eye with an awl by accident. The one eye was destroyed instantly, and the resulting infection claimed the other eye, making him blind by the time he was four. The accident spurred Braille to the invention of the famous Braille alphabet. Ironically, Braille created the raised-dot system by using an awl.