Laser Etched Leather Patches

This article was originally posted in August of 2013 on my previous site

Leather, patches, and laser beams — you couldn’t ask for a better combination. For the past few months I have been experimenting with making laser etched leather patches. The first set I did was a gift to my teammates with our team logo that I designed.

It took a lot of testing with scrap pieces of leather to get the settings right for the laser. Finding the right balance of speed and power for each piece of artwork was the real challenge. It is easy to lose small details if the settings are not dialed in. Sometimes it takes multiple passes with lower power to achieve a dark enough image and sill keep the fine details. The second design that I worked on was the Join or Die political cartoon by Benjamin Franklin. The settings for burning the snake image were very challenging.

I also did a few patches with my own logo on them as well as some luggage tags with contact information burned on the inside of the fold to keep it out of plain sight.

GORUCK’s leather patches sparked the idea for me to create these patches. I really liked the idea of a leather patch but wanted a way to have more intricate designs without the hassle of having a brand made. Then I got my hands on a laser engraver; I have a lot of other ideas in my head. We will see what is next.