Wallets That Aren’t Plain Leather: A Sampler

Stylish and Crafty

• Tiny Meat

While there are plenty of folks selling wallets on craft nexus Etsy, Tiny Meat’s wallets are not only interestingly varied in their design, but also cheap—usually around twelve bucks!

Pictured here is the simply-named “A squirrel, a guy and a pickle wallet.”

Bonus Selection: You can’t beat buying a wallet from Tiny Meat that is covered in photos of tiny meat.

• Queen Bee Creations – Should your taste err towards the pastel and precious, Queen Bee has several wallets both large and small, starting around $26. The Ginkgo Wonderboy Wallet [pictured] is especially nice and available in a variety of colors.

• Poketo – These hipsterish wallets feature designs from a variety of artists, each in limited edition. The current “Tokyo” series, curated by Chako Suzuki, has some very lovely wallets indeed. Four wallets from the Tokyo series are shown here, each available for a very reasonable $20.

We don’t say “hipsterish” dismissively, either. Presuming you’ve come to terms with owning a wallet with a design on it, there are a variety of styles available that should complement every outfit…except maybe business attire. Don’t miss the $15 sale wallets at the bottom, either.

Unique

• Pantone Wallets – If you don’t know who Pantone is you’ll probably not be interested in these bright, glossy wallets. (Hint: They’re a company that defines color palettes for the creative industries.)

At $35 a pop from this randomly-selected Yahoo store they aren’t cheap, but the Pantone.com store doesn’t seem to carry many of the products themselves, so you’ll have to make do. I’ve gathered that these are in limited edition, with new Pantone-matched colors available each year.

• Bad Mother Fucker Wallet – Please, for the love of your pasty, white ass, don’t buy this wallet. Especially not when, for 35 dollars, you could get so many more cool wallets that feature original art or hand-crafted construction.

But still, here it is. If you absolutely, positively have to kill every motherfucking conversation in the room…

Seriously, though. If you really want to try to add a little badness to your ass, just get a chain wallet.

• The Bacon Wallet – I actually bought one of these. I sort of wish I hadn’t. You may love it though, and it’s only eight smackers. (But think how much real bacon that would be!)

No, I don’t use it.

• Stainless-Steel Wallet – NASA scientists left the space program so they could dedicate their lives to creating pans wallets! This far-too-expensive wallet by Theo Stewart-Stand is made from a stainless-steel cloth that might just act as a Faraday cage for all those RFID chips in your credit cards (but probably not).

Available for a whopping $95 from the MoMA store, it offers none of the protection of encasing your money in a hunk of pig iron, but hardly any of the weight, either.

• The Jimi – Less a wallet and more of a wallet replacement, the Jimi is a hard plastic case big enough to hold five cards and a few folded bills. That’s it. But since it’s not much bigger than your credit cards in the first place, the Jimi can easily be slipped into a front pocket, saving you from back pain and journeyman pickpockets.

The Jimi is available in a variety of colors from their store for around $15. Oh, and it has a removable money clip that holds one card, should you want to take it as slim as you can.

I’ve had my eye on one of these for years, but still haven’t taken the plunge. I won’t today, either, because the black “Stealth” model is on back-order.

Duct Tape

In ascending order of chic (such as it is)…

• Duct Tape Fashion – These are definitely hand-made models, but they are quite inexpensive—just $7 for a simple one and not much more for additional pockets. While you’re there, you can also get duct tape belts, hats, visors, guitar straps, and backpacks. But don’t.

• Duct Tape Wallet by Ducti – Sold by ThinkGeek, this duct tape wallet is actually pretty nice, with grommets and few rough edges. (At least in the pictures.) At $15 it’s twice as expensive as the Duct Tape Fashion model and approaching the price of other, traditional wallets.

Perhaps you should skip the pre-made duct tape wallets altogether and consider…

• Making Your Own Duct Tape Wallet – You already have the materials around the house (don’t you?) and it’s just the kind of survival skill everyone should have. When the Reckoning comes, you will be able to barter your hand-made wallets for canned goods and sexual favors.

Bonus DIY Wallet: Make Your Own Wallet Out of Playing Cards.

Round-Ups

• The folks at 37 Signals built a Wists page of wallets, some of which we’ve discussed here, but many we haven’t.
• Our friends at Uncrate showcase wallets from time to time. Here’s their list.
• “Wallets” tag on Del.icio.us.