There are days in the workshop when I'm not cutting a bag, but shaping an idea. This piece began with a gate. Not just any gate, but Brâncuși's Gate of the Kiss in Târgu Jiu. A gate you pass through not to leave somewhere, but to reach someone. A threshold that doesn't separate, it invites.
I thought about this for a long time. How many thresholds we cross without feeling them. The door of a home, the line between who we were yesterday and who we're trying to become, the distance between what we are and what we long to be. Brâncuși took all these passages and poured them into a single form, simple, monumental, gentle. And I wanted to carry that form further, into leather.
The Copper That Catches the Light
The shine doesn't come from paint. It comes from copper leaf, applied to the leather through pressure and heat, a technique I developed over time and that stays the workshop's secret. Heat and pressure make the metal sink into the grain of the leather, not just sit on top of it. This way, the motif doesn't rest on the leather like a label. It becomes part of it.
Across the surface I drew a play of arches, columns and rosettes, the echo of a gate, of a façade, of a passage. The copper catches the light differently with every movement. At one angle it's warm and alive, like old gold; at another it retreats into shadow. Just as a gate looks one way as you approach and another as you leave it behind.
Made to Be Crossed by Hand
The leather is vegetable tanned, a slow process, free of harsh chemicals, that lets the material breathe and develop a beautiful patina over time. It's a leather that ages like a beloved object, not a used one. Inside, I lined it with lambskin, soft and warm to the touch. What is severe and architectural on the outside becomes gentle and welcoming within, exactly like a threshold.
The stitching isn't only what holds the piece together. I let it also be a decorative element, a braided contour along the edges that frames everything, like the frame of a gate. Every stitch is made by hand, one by one. There is no rush in this work, and I don't want there to be.
Every piece that leaves the workshop exists only once. I don't cut a second. This gate belongs to someone in particular. I don't yet know who, but I know they'll recognize it.
I like to think we carry a small gate with us, every day. Something that reminds us that passage isn't a loss, but a promise. That between what we are and what we long to become there is no wall, but a threshold, and that this threshold was made to be crossed.
This gate is still in the studio. You can see it here.
Wear Art. One of a kind pieces in vegetable tanned leather, handmade in the AG Design workshop.
