Back of the Napkin
The official blog for A. M. Aiken's founder (thinking quite big as he creates this), initially a place for him (Aaron) to put his thoughts and ideas as they relate to the various goods he makes...but will likely morph into what it needs to be as time passes. These are the scraps laying around his workshop, desk, suit coat pockets, and so on. Unpredictable things await.
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the feeling of making

One of my customers stopped by this afternoon to pickup their Strathmere Leather Weekend Bag...and when he carried the bag away, down my sidewalk, and put it into the back of his car, I felt a certain kind of way. A bittersweet feeling, for sure...and then I recorded the video linked here, maybe embedded below. Me jabbering, rambling, attempting to describe the feeling, and in doing so, talking about my creative process and what it is like to make things. 12 minutes long. At least my fresh haircut looks good :-) Cheers, ~ Aaron
August 21st, 2024

back of the napkin scribbles vol. 1

When I started working with leather it was intended only as a way for me to make what was needed for a few woodworking tools that had become homeless. They were removed from their original location in my previous workshop and needed new homes. New storage solutions that had to be mobile. Leather seemed like a quick way to keep things safe, organized, and simple to move as-needed. I drew ideas on paper, exactly how I continue to design things today, and then they came to life with leather. Everything seemed to click, seemed to work exactly as I intended,...
August 12th, 2024

email me to purchase

I recently finished building out the website for my latest bag in the Strathmere Leather lineup, Ocean Front, and got down to the end, the part where I need to seal the deal, make the sale, initiate payment, have money change hands. I thought about embedding the product directly from my Shopify site. That way you could just click or tap Buy Now, pay the money, and move on. Felt kind of yucky to me. Most of my products are quite personal in their origin, the inspiration of them has meaning to me, and putting a Buy Now button at...
July 23rd, 2024

A few Strathmere thoughts and updates

The post below originally appeared on my personal blog, putting it here because this is where thoughts like this belong as all of this is really some back of the napkin thinking. The StrathmereThe launch of The Strathmere leather weekend bag didn’t happen last week as I had originally planned. I want to launch the initial Strathmere Bag in tandem with The Strathmere Club which is going to be a membership program of sorts and offer an initial primary benefit of knocking 35% off the retail price of The Strathmere leather weekend bag. I want this initial launch to coincide...
May 13th, 2024

ideas

I’ve had the passing idea over the course of the past 4 or so years that it would be cool to have a camera setup to record me working and then I publish that somewhere. I listen to a lot of dj type music while I work, maybe have that tied to the published video somehow. Just an idea. Maybe a crazy weird one.  the Strathmere clubThe Strathmere leather weekend bag, something I worked on and finished making last week, has sparked many ideas for me. More bags, at least one more, I’ll write about that later, but also wider...
May 3rd, 2024

duffle bag

I have had on my list to make a duffle bag for weekend type trips for a few years now, probably since I first started getting into leather work. This week will be the week, I hope. It should be. Something I enjoy about the creative process is self-imposed deadlines. I leave on Friday for a quick beach trip, a trip I have known about since February. I could have started on the duffle then, really designed the thing out, but that’s not how I work best. I work best under pressure, controlled as much as possible. And so this...
April 22nd, 2024

new business cards

Up to this point in my life and “career” and such I have done all of my own design work. But I am not a designer. I don’t know the first thing about design, I just know what I like and what I don’t like. I also like to design in small batches, make something, put out there, see how it goes, and iterate. The new business cards are an upgrade from the previous batch I was using which were hand-stamped and really cool looking but really time consuming and time is something that I don’t have enough of lately...and...
April 9th, 2024
A. M. Aiken | 🕳️