One Star Leather Park Sloper Senior Notebook Wallet Review

One Star Leather Park Sloper Senior

I started journaling in 2011 in a Moleskine Cahier / Field Notes size notebook. My thoughts back then were that I wanted a canvas to jot my thoughts and ideas, and I felt using a phone to do that appeared too oblivious to others. When you see someone using their thumbs on their phone, you likely think they’re texting someone, but if you see someone writing in a notebook, you think elegance and sophistication.

A lot of my Moleskin Cahier sized notebooks were roughed up on the edges with the notebook spine almost fraying apart. My first notebook cover was purchased from Renaissance Art in ‘Flight Jacket’ Cover. Just a simple leather stitched notebook cover with a sleeve for the front and back of the notebook.

I used that for some time along with a Saddleback ID wallet for my everyday carry. I would jot down my workout numbers, notes from a sermon, and grocery lists. But the biggest issue that I had with the cover is that I’d often fumble finding my pen in the bag. I wanted a cover that integrated a pen slot with it. Lo and behold, the company that popped up after a Google Search of “moleskine cahier cover with pen slot” was One Star Leather Goods. I didn’t “need” the card slots as I had another wallet at the time, but it was attractive anyway. At the time in 2013, there was only one review online of it, mentioning that Keegan, the owner of One Star Leather, suggested a Natural Chromexcel exterior and a Hermann Oak leather interior for the card slots. This way, the Chromexcel will age and develop a patina beautifully with time and the Hermann Oak leather will minimize card stretch. I browsed through One Star Leather’s Etsy site and found the exact same makeup!

Park Sloper Senior without the notebook
Park Sloper Senior interior

Details

Cost: $141.00 including shipping

Ordered on 11/17/2013

Park Sloper Senior can fit a Moleskin Cahier or Field Notes or other similarly sized notebooks. The Parker Sloper Sr has a pen sleeve on the exterior that is designed to swallow the whole pen including the clip. In later versions, Keegan added the option to remove the pen slot.

Exterior:  Horween Natural Chromexcel Leather

Interior card slot leather: Hermann Oak Brown Leather

Interior slot for folded bills or receipts
Interior slot for folded bills or receipts

Initial Impressions

The Chromexcel leather had a overwhelming smell of quality leather and had great pullup leather quality. Natural Chromexcel started as a light brown color with much variation in color and darkened with use. The pen I was using at the time was a Zebra F-701 Stainless Steel Retractable Pen and the pen slot was large enough to swallow the whole pen. Two logos were present, one on the inside between the card slots, and the other stamped on the inside back. I liked that the logos were not gaudy or present on the outside, just subtle.

The Brown Hermann Oak leather I chose for the card slots was more rigid, lacking pullup quality, but stretched a lot less than Chromexcel. Even though I had a wallet at the time, I tested the card slots by stacking many cards, perhaps up to 4 cards each. Also, the stitching and thread were very well performed without any crookedness/misalignment.

To this day, I went through a lot of Moleskin Cahiers, perhaps up to 12, and the Park Sloper wallet held up very well. The natural Chromexcel darkened quite quickly and absorbed denim bleed. More than 4 years with it, I feel that the color has saturated and won’t get any darker. I never used the Park Sloper primarily as a wallet, but as a notebook cover instead. I would sometimes keep a few rarely used cards in the cover because I wanted to slim down my primary wallet. In the jeans I wore at the time, the Park Sloper with a pen fit comfortably in my back pocket.

There was later occasion where I switched over to a Parker Jotter pen which was significantly thinner. Because the pen sleeve had stretched out, if I turned the wallet upside down, the Parker Jotter would fall out. I remedied this issue by wetting the whole pen sleeve with water and taking a hairdryer on high to it. The chromexcel leather shrunk and then the sleeve only stretched out to the slimmer size.

Pull-up leather quality on the Horween Natural CXL
Pull-up leather quality on the Horween Natural CXL

The only other notebook cover I purchased after was a Loyal Stricklin Edison Wallet in Honey Harness leather. The total price for this wallet including shipping was $147.03. I initially purchased this wallet because I saw a pictures of a beautiful patinaed version by @har.bach on IG. A few differences I would note from this wallet: the pen sleeve instead is on the interior which creates additional thickness, and it has 3 vertical card slots instead of horizontal. When I used all the card slots, they would overlap and create too much thickness. In conclusion, the Edison Wallet ended up being too “thick” especially when it was in my back pocket, and I retired it after a few months.  The quality and stitching of the wallet was on point though!  I loved the patina created from the Wickett & Craig harness leather.

Conclusion

I love the One Star Leather Park Sloper wallet just as much as the same day I received it. The leather has darkened significantly, but has varying tones in direct sunlight. I like that the pen slot is on the exterior because it doesn’t add that much more thickness when it’s in your rear pant pocket. I now use a Tactile Turn  Glider Pen in Titanium which is a lot thicker than the Zebra, so I actually place the pen clip on the exterior (I really don’t want to risk tearing the pen slot) . I would absolutely recommend this notebook cover if you’re looking for a field notes sized wallet with a pen sleeve. I tried searching for alternatives, but none other have sufficed as well as this design!

Tanner Goods Legacy Cardholder Wallet Review

Back when I started getting into menswear in 2011-2012, the most recommended wallet was a Saddleback ID card holder. I still have that very same one. Front pocket wallets that were slim had a huge popularity then. No one wanted a large bifold wallet that could potentially give you back pain in the long run!

The first time I was able to feel a Tanner Goods Cardholder wallet was at Unionmade’s flagship in San Francisco. I noticed that the current version was made with a full cover flap instead of an angled flap piece that I had seen online.

I purchased the Tanner Goods Legacy Cardholder in Chestnut Dublin leather sometime in early 2015 for about 85$. It was the first time TG brought back the “angled design” now calling it Legacy Cardholder. To me, the cardholder with the angled flap is the iconic Tanner Goods piece. The Dublin cardholder started with very interesting characteristics such as tiger striping. The dublin leather felt very similar to Chromexcel but seemed to have more variation.

 

What’s cool about the design is that it’s made from only two pieces of leather. On the rear side there are two wrap around leather pieces from where you can store folded bills. The interior can support up to about 15 cards and will still even stretch to accomodate more (depends on the leather). You can also place cash in the interior with a bill folded in half once in either orientation.

What I love: Simple and iconic design. Quality leather and hardware. Made in the USA.

Ehh: Takes time to get used to a cardholder (looking for credit card within the stack of cards) but all cardholders essentially have this problem. Bills have to be folded in an “undesired” way – either folded twice to fit in the back or folded once and creased on the edge.

 

One Star Leather Coin Pouch Business Card Case Review

Intro

When I was younger and out and about grocery shopping with my parents, they always carried a small zippered coin pouch with them. Often times, it was filled to the brim with quarters, what we used in coin laundry. All of this was part of the experience growing up under a generation that was not used to using credit cards or loans. Instead, every other weekend or so, my parents would withdraw cash from the ATM and allocate that towards for groceries and expenses. That way, we would know how much money we were spending and not go over budget.
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