Leather Bracelets
After I graduated from college, I was unable to continue pursuing ceramics to the degree I wanted to because of the cost of necessary studio space. In keeping with my characteristic hobby-wandering, I decided to take up something entirely new.
Traditional leathercraft has a very particular visual style - think of the ornamentation on a saddle or a pair of cowboy boots. I appreciate the aesthetic but have no interest in throwing my hat into that particular ring. It became a challenge, in the face of a craft with certain stylistic expectations, to find a means of surface decoration that was almost entirely outside of those expectations. How-to materials, beginner's tool sets, and even websites operate under the assumption that a new entrant to the field is aiming squarely at a traditional visual language. Thankfully, after a few remarkably pleasant trips to my local Tandy Leather and conversations with the employees, I found a way to recreate my ceramic carvings in leather. I quickly set about making some simple wearable pieces, feeling that decorative items of that sort were a natural place for this tooling style, and enjoying leathercraft's relatively low barrier to entry. I felt confident in a few core techniques right away - an invaluable way to maintain creative momentum.
I did, of course, try my hand at using the tooling stamps I inevitably bought for their actual intended use, and I'm happy with the results when I did so, but my interest remains in the more, I suppose, avant-garde vibes of my ceramic carving style. I have an enormous respect for the people who operate more traditionally - those designs are terribly difficult to get the hang of, at least for me, and the tooling process itself is intricate, complicated, and physically demanding.
With a few bracelets under my belt (metaphorically), my attention wandered to other constructions. My functional art pursuits are often directed by what sort of stuff I happen to be coveting at the time, and in this case, I needed a new wallet, so a new wallet I would make. Why spend $50 on something new right now when I can spend $100 and two weeks of my time to make it myself?
