Springs in the Dale – a Springdale, Arkansas leather collection
From the Practice Log – an ongoing series of leather stamping studies.
An August study.
Springs in the Dale is a small leather collection rooted in Springdale, Arkansas – a town that chose its own name in 1872 and chose well. Five original stamps, pressed into luggage tags, journals and the other small leather goods a day runs on.
First, we sent the luggage tags through the Winslow Tunnel. An excursion train still leaves Springdale for the Boston Mountains through the same bore it has used since 1882, and we cut the whole departure into one stamp – the stone arch, and the rails running into the dark. Forest green and caramel take a blind press. The black tag carries the design in gold.
Next, the keychains. Springdale raised the birds that fed a country, then named a mountain bike trail Thunder Chicken – so we drew the rooster at full downhill charge, tail feathers gone to lightning. On the black fob the bolt strikes in gold.
It looks just awesome in the hand.
Then we stamped the corner of the toiletry bags with an invitation – MEET ME ON EMMA, set around a downtown streetlamp. Emma Avenue is where Springdale gathers, and the honeyed russet of the leather sits about a brick's width from the avenue's own color, over a base of deep espresso brown.
After that, the catchall tray. The Ozark Quilt Fair fills the Shiloh Museum grounds every year, and Arkansas Traveler is one of the old blocks quilters there still piece – so we pieced ours in solid black and set it spinning in the middle of the golden tan tray, where the day's loose pieces come home.
And finally, the design the collection is named for. In 1872 the town asked for a post office under the name Shiloh and learned Arkansas already had one – the name that came back was Springdale, short for springs in the dale. We set the phrase so the words walk down into their own valley and up the far side, with the spring rising where they touch bottom. A journal felt like the right home for a name that began as a written suggestion – one cover in pale sea-blue for the water, one in caramel for the dale.
It turned out genuinely beautiful.
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 any of these made real, or anything here changed – say hello through our contact page.
P.S.
