For Out of Death Comes Life

In this complicated life on earth we experience loss over and over again, from the grocery run that yielded none of your favorite jelly, to the indelible ache of death.

We lose keys, we lose lovers and we misplace our dignity now and again, but if we're lucky enough to have pluck and support we move through our grief and into a wiser, larger soul.

We shed our outmoded selves. 

We welcome in strangers who become friends. 

We learn the hard-to-explain lesson of wisdom with each heartbeat that carries us past caverns that losing has carved into our heart.

There is no life without death, and there truly is no death without a life.

In the spirit of winter, grief and rebirth I built this clutch from scratch, each rivet hand-set, each stitch hand-pulled.

Immortalized in leather is the Wright's Beach bird skull that in real life is a silent blessing on the third shelf of my studio hutch.

On the back is the skull's shape, reversed and inlaid with a panel of leather featuring an explosion of ripe roses.

On the inside, held firm and steady by nearly 100 rivets is a vintage cloth with the warmest touch, edges hand-frayed to create an inviting softness.

The bag closure is a buckled soft leather pull.

It measures 10X5 and can be filled with all the essentials of a night out or a day with friends.

This is most assuredly one of a kind, not to be replicated, but to be cherished by someone who understands what beauty can come from something that hurts.

In the Leather Shop soon.