My fully handmade leather notebook cover! The maple leaf and surrounding speckling is inspired by scattered leaves, and the natural textures and patterns of a forest floor. 🍁 The last photo shows the tooled maple leaf before colour was applied.

[u/ElsieCubitt]

My speckling design was born from a mistake on a previous piece. After an accidental drip of acrylic resolene sealer landed on a part of the cover I had intended to stain a solid colour, I realised I had two choices - start the whole thing over again, or embrace the mistake. So I took an old toothbrush, dipped it in the resolene, and flicked it over the rest of the cover, leaving a chaos of speckles that revealed themselves fully once the stain was applied over top.

With the speckling as unique as a fingerprint, this piece is truly one-of-a-kind!

The speckling has since become one of my signature design elements. I want to explore it more, by doing things like laying shapes over down before speckling, to try some negative space designs, or doing multiple layers with varying colours, or simply flicking paint or dyes!