The Bijou Collection – a Colorado Springs leather stamping study

From the Practice Log – an ongoing series of stamping studies on real-world logos.

An August study.

The Bijou Collection – leather for downtown Colorado Springs, where the grid was drawn so the streets would end in mountain views, and where one of those streets is named for a jewel. Small leather goods, luggage tags to journals, each stamped with something mined from the Springs.

First, the sightline every local knows. We drew the view straight west along a downtown block – storefronts converging until Pikes Peak closes the street – and set LOOK WEST overhead.

The LOOK WEST street and mountain stamp from The Bijou Collection of downtown Colorado Springs.

The tags run warm red and navy, with a true black third; the black tag carries the gold.

Warm red, navy and black leather luggage tags stamped with LOOK WEST from The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

The same street crosses the catchall tray in golden tan, so the keys land facing west.

A golden tan leather catchall tray stamped with the LOOK WEST design from The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

Next, the block's own word. Bijou Street borrowed its name from a basin out on the plains, and bijou means a small jewel – so we cut one in fine facets and set a tiny Pikes Peak inside the table, right where a jeweler looks first.

The faceted mountain jewel stamp from The Bijou Collection of downtown Colorado Springs.

On the black fob the jewel takes the gold pass; the vivid magenta fob stays blind. Looks great when stamped onto the leather.

Black and vivid magenta leather keychains stamped with the mountain jewel from The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

Then, the oldest line on this trail. PIKES PEAK OR BUST rode west painted on wagon canvas, so we struck it as a prospector's token, with a sun busting over the summit inside the ring.

The PIKES PEAK OR BUST token stamp from The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

The kits stack golden tan over deep brown, blind debossed.

Golden tan and deep brown leather toiletry bags stamped with PIKES PEAK OR BUST from The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

And finally, the one we liked the most. In the summer of 1893, a trip up Pikes Peak came back down as the first lines of America the Beautiful – so the journals carry O BEAUTIFUL arched over the mountain, pressed into the corner where first lines tend to begin.

The O BEAUTIFUL Pikes Peak stamp from The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

One journal is dusty lavender, for the purple mountain majesties; the other, deep pine green for the ponderosa slopes. It turned out genuinely beautiful.

Dusty lavender and deep pine green leather journals stamped O BEAUTIFUL for The Bijou Collection of Colorado Springs.

We made this out of love. Leatherius Woodman is on a mission to create and share artifacts of beauty, craft and love – this study is one of them, and we hope the feeling is mutual. Every image is a render – how we prototype before cutting a die.

If you'd like anything here made real, or anything here changed – say hello through our contact page.