J Designs × Leatherius Woodman – a leather stamping study

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

An August study.

For J Designs.

First, the warm-up: we pressed the looping j onto the luggage tags, deep wine for their oxblood and pale warm greige for their ivory. The black tag carries the j in gold.

J Designs' looping lowercase j mark in its deep oxblood color

Sangria, gray-sand and black leather luggage tags bearing the J Designs looping j

Next, the keychains. A key spends its life at doors, so we drew one the way the studio draws them – in plan, with the leaf swung open and its swing traced in a dashed arc – and wrote COME ON IN beneath. One fob in deep wine, the other in pale warm greige.

Looks great when stamped onto the leather.

Black and white Come On In door-swing die artwork

Sangria and gray-sand leather keychains stamped Come On In beneath a door swing

Then the wash bags. J Designs keeps fresh air and natural light front and center, so the corner of each bag got a casement window thrown open, sun coming through – the first thing to open in the morning. Warm plaster gray stacked over deep espresso.

Black and white Air and Light open-window die artwork

Country-gray and dark-espresso leather dopp kits stamped with an open window and sun

Then the journals, one in deep wine and one in black. The stamp sits in the lower right corner of the cover, exactly where the title block sits on a drawing sheet – so we drew a title block, with the project line left blank and the scale already filled in. Whatever gets written here happens at full size.

Black and white architectural title-block die artwork

Sangria and black leather journals stamped with a J Designs architectural title block

And finally, the words themselves. J Designs says every piece has a purpose – so every piece in this study carries its own design, and the golden tan tray carries the words, beneath a little furnished room in plan where each symbol has its place. A catchall is where the day's pieces land.

It looks genuinely beautiful.

Black and white Every Piece Has a Purpose furnished-plan die artwork

Golden-tan leather catchall tray stamped Every Piece Has a Purpose beneath a furnished plan

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're J Designs and you'd like these made real, or anything here changed – say hello through our contact page.