Leather Roll-Up Charging Station

This is another iteration of my original Roll Up Charging Station, inspired by this Simple Leather Clutch by Holly Mann . Like my original flexible charging station, this one:

• Still has a small footprint - About 18" long and about 12" wide - and is suitably squishy
• Can charge up to five devices
• Makes it easy to swap out old devices for new ones
• And is inexpensive (I got the leather at an outdoors event from a tailgater for just $10

And with the advent of the leather, the new charging station:

• Has that nice leather aroma
• Has a larger device storage area utilizing felt instead of a Velcro strip
• Is softer to the touch and unique in appearance.

Materials needed for Leather Roll Up Charging Station are:

Leather

4-6 outlet powerstrip

Felt

Sticky back Velcro

Velcro strips

Scissors

Your chargers

I chose about a 9" square piece of felt and stitched it to the bottom end (opposite the power strip) of my leather roll up. If I were as awesome as Holly Mann, I would have hand sewn it like she did with her leather clutch. But I used a much lighter piece of leather and the commercial machine we have handled it just fine.

A couple of punched holes and leather straps do the trick just fine, and hold the power strip securely.

And I almost did - this is all there is to the original Roll Up Charging Station.

But then decided I wanted to have those side flaps I'd considered the first time around but couldn't find a nice way to attach to the vinyl shelf liner.

For the side flaps, I took the remaining square foot of leather I had and cut it in half. If you're working with a bigger piece of leather than I had, you could simply cut your pattern to include the side flaps and no sewing would be required.

Just put the faces together and run a line of stitching the length of the flap. Repeat on the other side. Leather artisans with some serious skill could do their stitching with some nice leather cord, for a really attractive finish.

With the felt square, I can attach chargers and cords anywhere on it, although it does roll up more nicely if I keep the devices in a general sweet spot, which you can determine for yourself based on whatever charging devices you're using. If you use felt, be sure you use the hook (bristly) part of Velcro fasteners on your devices instead of the hoop (soft) part, which won't attach to the felt.

Close the flaps, start from the top at the powerstrip, and roll 'er up! I secured the whole thing with another leather strap but you can use a piece of suede cord, like in the Leather Clutch, or do a loop over a button. Easy to store in a laptop bag, or in your glovebox!

Just like my vinyl roll up, using this one is a matter of unrolling it, plugging in the powerstrip and then charging whatever devices I'd like, now on a nice leather mat!