The Kenai Line – a leather collection of vintage rail travel and the Kenai Mountains (Volume I-A)

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

A September study. Volume I-A.

The Kenai Line is a small collection about vintage rail travel through the Kenai Mountains – valley walls sliding past a carriage window, a ticket folded into a coat pocket. Every piece in the study took a different seat on the train.

First, we gave the collection its own baggage label, the kind porters once pasted onto steamer trunks – a luggage tag is that label's last living descendant. KENAI MOUNTAINS arches over snow-striped peaks, and a single track curves through the notch to the words BY RAIL.

Black-and-white KENAI MOUNTAINS BY RAIL baggage-label die artwork for The Kenai Line, Volume I-A.

It looks genuinely beautiful. We pressed it blind into railway navy and deep carriage green, and once more into warm tan.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia baggage label luggage tags blueberry.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia baggage label luggage tags forest green.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia baggage label luggage tags caramel.

Next, the journals took the window seat. We framed a carriage window around still water and a snow-striped ridge, and set WINDOW SEAT beneath the sill – a journal is where the view gets written down before it fades.

Black-and-white WINDOW SEAT carriage-window and Kenai ridge die artwork for The Kenai Line, Volume I-A.

Looks great when stamped onto the leather – once in deep green, once in warm tan.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia window seat leather journals forest green.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia window seat leather journals caramel.

Then we printed the ticket. RETURN TICKET, ruled like the old card stock and punched once by the conductor – because a ring of keys is the one ticket that always brings you home. Black carries the gold. Navy takes the same press blind.

Black-and-white KENAI LINE RETURN TICKET die artwork for The Kenai Line, Volume I-A.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia return ticket keychains black.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia return ticket keychains blueberry.

After that, the sleeper car. A crescent moon hangs over the ridge in a curtained berth window, with SLEEPER CAR beneath – the bag that travels overnight earned the overnight car. It rides a navy kit stacked on deep espresso brown.

Black-and-white SLEEPER CAR moonlit carriage-window die artwork for The Kenai Line, Volume I-A.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia sleeper car dopp kits blueberry dark espresso.

And finally, the end of the line. On the golden tan tray a straight track runs home to its buffer stop beneath the range – the place where everything carried all day comes to rest.

Black-and-white END OF THE LINE rail-buffer and mountain die artwork for The Kenai Line, Volume I-A.

Looks absolutely gorgeous when stamped onto the leather.

Individual leather product render from The Kenai Line, Volume I-A: kenai rail volume ia end of the line catchall tray arizona.

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 these made real, or anything here changed – say hello through our contact page.