Fall Cyanotypes and British Racing Green

New Work for September

August ends with school supplies and leather orders.

The first leather order of what will eventually be the work I have ready for the holidays has arrived. I've spent the last few weeks looking over what sold well last year and taking inventory on what I might be running low on.

Today I starting cutting down the leather. In this batch I'll be getting a full set of wallets (Belhoste, Ensign, and Pointsmen) in British Racing green. I'm dedicating the other half to making a new collection of cyanotypes on leather.

The cyano-leather is the part I'm most looking forward to. I have some new ideas I would like to try out.

In the past I've relied on straight forward botanical silhouettes. In the print work I've been doing this year I've been exploring the idea of depth and layers. I've been trying to make a foreground, middle, and background and it's resulted in what I've been thinking of as the canopy effect. Leaf shadows passing through each other.

I'm hoping to figure out how to translate this onto leather. I'm imagining layers of ghostly maple leaves overlapping each other.

Cyanotypes on leather are finicky though. It can be hard to keep subtle detail from washing out. If that happens I'll just end up with splotchy leather.

Part two

Sowing Seeds in the Dark

How do you know when an idea has run its course?

For me it just fizzles out one day. The last set of images I made for this collection worked that way. As I took them from between the blotter sheets I was drying them between I could see the spark had gone out. I think I knew it while I was making them.

An idea runs it's course. They grow from little seeds, blossom, ripen, and then die off, hopefully leaving a few new seeds behind.

For now I'm done thinking about developing these images. When I started this project I had an idea of mostly white images with ghostly hints of leaves. What I ended up with was different and I think more satisfying.

I made a few pieces that have that ghostly quality.

What I really fell in love with was what happens when I toned them. You can't tell when you look at the images but the way the light hits the paper as it comes through the window makes a subtle gradient.

If I soak the paper in washing soda the image fades. The lightest areas going first. The darkest areas come along much slower. Its possible to pull the images out in the middle of this split. The highlights running away from the shadows. Suddenly the gradient is there.

A second exposure of blue over the top of this gradient brings out the potential of the idea. Two images, both faint and barely there, but combined to make something new.

They look like pastel drawings. Not cyanotypes.

I've done my best to photograph them but I already know they are going to be difficult to capture. They are very quiet images. Reflections of the time in which I made them.

I've gotten a little design time in last month. So there are some new additions to the shop.  

First I've finally started to play around with some leathers other than the vegetable tanned leather I usually work with.

This is the Magellan Notebook reworked with some Oil Tanned Leather.

And I came up with a little pouch made from the same. If you are not familiar with oil tanned leather it was mainly used for chaps and motorcycle bags since it's pretty water resistant. It also has a pull-up which means the leather gets lighter where you bend and scratch it. It's also a lot softer than veg tan leather.

Finally I released a new version of the passport case. This is the first time I'm making them available online. This is version 3.0 for those playing along at home.

All of these new items and many others can be found in the store here.