The Rose City Line – a Tyler, Texas leather collection

From the Practice Log – an ongoing series of stamping studies on real-world logos.

An August study.

Tyler, Texas is the Rose Capital of America, and the story behind the title is better than the title. We pressed that story into leather and called the collection THE ROSE CITY LINE.

First, the flagship. When the peach orchards failed, East Texas growers turned to roses; the sandy loam took to them, and in 1917 the first full train carload of Tyler roses left town by rail. So we drew a rose whose stem is the track that carried it, crossties and all, under a line the town once used – FOR YOU A ROSE IN TYLER GROWS.

The rose-and-rail stamp design from The Rose City Line leather collection of Tyler, Texas.

On the luggage tags it stands upright in petal blush and Piney Woods green. The black tag carries the gold.

Three leather luggage tags stamped with the rose-and-rail design from The Rose City Line collection of Tyler, Texas.

The same rose signs the corner of the journals, in deep wine and pine green – the bloom and the leaf. Looks great when stamped onto the leather.

Sangria and forest green leather journals stamped with the rose-and-rail design from The Rose City Line collection of Tyler, Texas.

Next, the freight stencil. A boxcar full of roses needed marking, so the die is the marking: CONTENTS ROSES in stencil letters, with PERISHABLE above and TYLER TEXAS below.

The CONTENTS ROSES freight-stencil design from The Rose City Line leather collection of Tyler, Texas.

We stamped it on the toiletry bags – honeyed russet over creosote-dark espresso, crate wood riding on crossties.

Two leather toiletry bags stamped with CONTENTS ROSES from The Rose City Line collection of Tyler, Texas.

Then the catchall tray, golden tan like the sandy loam itself, where everything you drop in ships as roses.

An Arizona leather catchall tray stamped with CONTENTS ROSES from The Rose City Line collection of Tyler, Texas.

And finally, the tender one. Tyler's municipal rose garden is a national test garden; new varieties grow out their trial seasons wearing tags on their canes, waiting for a verdict. We went ahead and wrote it – DOING BEAUTIFULLY.

The DOING BEAUTIFULLY rose-tag design from The Rose City Line leather collection of Tyler, Texas.

On the keychains, in festival red and pale garden stone, the little tag hangs from your keys the way it hangs from the cane. It looks genuinely beautiful.

Two leather keychains stamped with DOING BEAUTIFULLY from The Rose City Line collection of Tyler, Texas.

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 the Rose City Line made real, or anything here changed – say hello through our contact page.