Pride of Place – a Volume II leather stamping study of everyday honors

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

A September study. Volume II.

Pride of Place is a small leather collection about the honors a household pays its everyday things – the phrase names the best spot in the room, the one kept for what you treasure. Five original stamps, and each gives a daily object its due.

First, the luggage tags. A barn swallow crosses a continent twice a year and still finds the barn it hatched in, so we drew one banking down toward that barn, over the words KNOWS THE WAY HOME – the one promise a luggage tag exists to keep.

The KNOWS THE WAY HOME swallow and barn design for leather stamping, shown as black die art on white.

It looks genuinely beautiful – in navy and in warm tan.

The black tag carries the swallow in gold.

A navy leather luggage tag blind-stamped with a swallow, a barn and KNOWS THE WAY HOME.

A warm tan leather luggage tag blind-stamped with a swallow, a barn and KNOWS THE WAY HOME.

A black leather luggage tag gold-stamped with a swallow, a barn and KNOWS THE WAY HOME.

Next, we drew a porch lantern in the Craftsman manner, four white panes in a black frame, above the words CARRY LIGHT. Keys are what you take when you step out after dark, and the phrase means both things at once: bring a light, and travel light.

The CARRY LIGHT porch-lantern design for leather stamping, shown as black die art on white.

The black fob carries the lantern in gold; on deep pine green it presses blind, a lamp in the woods.

A black leather keychain gold-stamped with a porch lantern and CARRY LIGHT.

A deep green leather keychain blind-stamped with a porch lantern and CARRY LIGHT.

Then the journals. A press counts its copies; a page written by hand has exactly one. So a printer's leaf stands in the cover corner over the words AN EDITION OF ONE – the rarest book in any house is the one being written in it.

The AN EDITION OF ONE printer-leaf design for leather stamping, shown as black die art on white.

Looks great when stamped onto the leather – one journal in deep wine, one in pale sand.

A deep wine leather journal blind-stamped with a printer leaf and AN EDITION OF ONE.

A pale sand leather journal blind-stamped with a printer leaf and AN EDITION OF ONE.

After that, the toiletry bags. The kit keeps the sink shelf and stays up later than anyone, so a small owl under a crescent moon takes the lower corner, above the words NIGHT WATCH. True black over deep espresso brown – unfoiled, the press reads as a quiet shadow relief.

The NIGHT WATCH owl-and-moon design for leather stamping, shown as black die art on white.

Black and deep espresso leather toiletry bags blind-stamped with an owl, a moon and NIGHT WATCH.

And finally, the one we liked the most. Museums set their treasures on plinths, so we built one – four small squares on its face, in the old four-square rhythm – and stood a single key on top under a little crown of rays, with PRIDE OF PLACE beneath. The golden tan tray performs this ceremony every evening, for whatever your pockets held.

The PRIDE OF PLACE key-on-plinth design for leather stamping, shown as black die art on white.

Looks absolutely gorgeous when stamped onto the leather.

A golden tan leather catchall tray blind-stamped with an upright key on a Craftsman plinth and PRIDE OF PLACE.

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.

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