One year ago, I fell hard for the Olive Traveler’s Notebook—dark green, earthy, calm, and honestly a little bit Indiana Jones. I bought it for that outdoorsy, nostalgic tone and because it felt like a quiet rebellion against the usual brown leather options. In this video, I give you my promised one-year patina review after using it every single day for journaling and jotting things down, plus bringing it along to coffee shops, work, hiking, and travel. Here’s the spoiler: it’s no longer olive. Over time, the sun, my hand oils, and just normal wear and tear shifted the color into a darker brown. The leather itself has become incredibly soft, broken in, and pliable—smooth to the touch compared to that slightly textured feel when it was new. You can still catch hints of yellow-green under scuffs, but the green has basically disappeared. And while I love the journey and the history it’s collected, I’m genuinely on the fence about whether I’d choose olive again if I knew it would end up looking like a dark brown TN.