The Government Island Collection × Leatherius Woodman - a Garden City, Idaho leather stamping study

From the Practice Log – an ongoing series of leather stamping studies.

An August study.

For Garden City, Idaho – Volume II of our studies from the narrow city on the Boise River. We call this one THE GOVERNMENT ISLAND COLLECTION.

First, the ground under everything. Before the gardens that named the city, this bend of the river held Government Island, where the Army cut hay for the horses of Fort Boise. We drew the channel parting and meeting again, and set the oldest name on the land in between.

Black-and-white Government Island stamp artwork for The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

It looks genuinely beautiful on the luggage tags.

Three leather luggage tags stamped with Government Island, from The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

Next, the words Garden City wrote about itself when the studios moved in along the river. LIVE WORK CREATE is the Surel Mitchell district's own language, and we stacked it plain, the way a motto should ride in a pocket.

Black-and-white Live Work Create stamp artwork for The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

The black fob carries the gold.

Black and red leather keychains stamped Live Work Create, from The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

Then, the gardens the city is named for. Chinese immigrant farmers worked these parcels and supplied produce across southern Idaho, and the city kept their word for the place. We drew one market garden the way a surveyor would – beds in rows and a walking path – above the plain truth: THE GARDENS THAT NAMED THE CITY.

Black-and-white market garden stamp artwork for The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

Looks great when stamped onto the leather.

Two leather toiletry bags stamped with the gardens that named the city, from The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

Then, for the catchall tray, the headgate. Thurman Mill Ditch still takes its water in near the Whitewater Park, and a headgate is the honest machine of that bargain – a wheel above a gate, measuring the river into the ditch. The tray comes in golden tan, the only leather we make it in.

Black-and-white Thurman Mill headgate stamp artwork for The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

An arizona leather catchall tray stamped with the Thurman Mill headgate, from The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

And finally, the season every garden note is addressed to. A pruned branch with one bud already set, and NEXT SPRING beneath it – because everything a gardener writes down in August is a letter to April.

Black-and-white Next Spring branch stamp artwork for The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

Looks absolutely gorgeous when stamped onto the leather.

Two leather journals stamped Next Spring, from The Government Island Collection of Garden City, Idaho.

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 anything here should be made real, or made differently – say hello through our contact page.