The International Collective × Leatherius Woodman – a leather stamping study
From the Practice Log – an ongoing series of stamping studies on real-world marks.
A July study.
The International Collective is a luxury travel agency built around Julia Crosby, its CEO and lead travel designer. The homepage states the trade without blush: her team “masters the art of personalized travel planning”, and the site spends a whole page on why a human advisor still earns their keep in a booking-engine world. We place the studio in Atlanta, going by local coverage; the pages themselves keep the street address to themselves, which suits a firm whose promise runs on trust.
What stopped us was the mark. A small stacked serif wordmark in near-black, with “CURATING ELEVATED TRAVEL” set beneath it. Under the tagline stands a little elephant, the traveler that remembers every road it has walked. Serif capitals at tag scale sit near the limit of what a brass die will hold, and a tiny illustrated animal is harder still. We wanted to know whether the whole lockup would come through the press with its dignity intact. It did.
The mark, as found
Pressed
Gray-sand answers the light neutral ground of their pages, while caramel picks up the warm gold in their photography. Black carries the gold foil.
The Elevated Elephant
The companion takes their tagline at its word. A plain hot-air balloon rides the top of the square, two curved gore lines echoing its outline; four rigging lines fall from the throat to a soft two-strap sling, and in the sling hangs the elephant, legs dangling loose, trunk curled up toward the balloon in a gentle S. “CURATING ELEVATED TRAVEL” runs beneath in plain capitals. We pressed it lengthwise on the same leathers. We went back and forth on a wicker basket under the balloon and left it out; the bare sling says more about trust, though we admit the choice cost the picture a little storybook charm.
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 The International Collective and you'd like these made real, or anything here changed – say hello through our contact page.