Tag Archives: handmade

Book Cloth

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I am a firm believer in making book cloth the old-fashioned
traditional way: paste, thin paper and fabric. It’s been done for, well,
centuries and it works and it’s not too hard.

First you need a starch paste. I like wheat paste. It’s
cheap and easy to find. All you need is pastry flour or wheat starch and water.
Pastry or cake flour is available in any grocery store and wheat starch is
available in specialty stores. You can also buy “real” wheat paste. Mix a 1:4
ratio of flour to water. Mix it well, no lumps. Now cook it, whisk constantly
over medium low heat until it becomes glossy and translucent. This amount of
paste will make a lot of book cloth and paste paper. I would suggest using
distilled water it won’t have any funny chemicals in it that will discolor
later. If you are an acid free freak add a ½ tsp to baking soda to the water it
will neutralize any acid content.

Cut your fabric to the size you would like. Use pre-washed
and ironed fabric so that it doesn’t shrink when you are gluing it. Cut your
thin paper 1 inch larger all around than the fabric. I really like washi paper
best but student grade sumi painting paper is more than perfect.

Now you need to spread your glue. There are lots of
differing opinions about how to do this, some people like to use a rubber
spreader and other like glue brushes and others like cheap chip brushes or
gesso brushes. I’m a brush woman myself. I used to use a 2-inch wide chip
brush. It worked great, but now that I’m working with a smaller size of paper I
use a medium glue brush. I suggest you try a variety of styles and see what
works for you.

I hold my paper down with one hand in the center, spread
glue allover the edges- generously. And then start to work the center. Work the
glue around until the wrinkles relax out of the paper. With thin washi paper it
takes 20 seconds or so for this to happen, constantly move the brush and glue,
work fast and loose, spread the glue generously. Don’t skimp on the glue. When
you see the paper relax, start to move excess glue to the edge and off the
paper. You don’t want a ton of glue on there when you put the fabric on the paper;
you want a thin EVEN layer.

Now your paper is relaxed with a thin even layer, you need
to drop your fabric to the glue covered paper wrong side down into the glue.
Gently rub the fabric into the glue. Now you need to pick the fabric, glue and
paper sandwich up and take it to a window and place the sandwich to the window,
fabric side to the glass, the extra glue covered paper will hold the paper and
fabric taught while it dries keeping it for the most part flat and keeping
tension on the fabric. (If you are lucky to have it- old window panes work
great for this- I was lucky that when I bought my house there were several large
pieces of plate glass in the garage.) AS it dries the paper will peel away from
the glass, if it doesn’t it cleans easily with soap and water.

There are many reasons to back your cloth with paper. First it
makes the fabric very easy to work with when binding, you fabric won’t stretch
when you glue it to you board. Secondly it keeps the color of the cloth true to
the fabric. Third, it decreases glue seepage. Fourth it makes a strong durable
bond of fabric to paper to board. There are several tutorials out there for
making book cloth with wonder under or other fusible interfacing. While it’s
fast and easy to use its more expensive and unknown in terms of it’s being
archival or acid free. (Let it be known here that I’m not an acid free freak.
There are books and paper out there that were made long before PH was
understood so my philosophy is that you can do what you want and most things
are going to outlive you and probably your children.

 

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Mini Hedgehog Notebook, really mini

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A comment was made about mini books and I’ve made them in the past, so I thought I’d make a few more. These measure 1×1 inch and about 1/4 inch thick. The stitching is smythe or hedgehog/moleskine style. Working in this size was not compatible with my full sized tools, so I made a few mini tools- including a sewing cradle an an awl. For folds and scoring I might have to look into making some sort of folder.

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Mad Matchbook Binding Project of ’07

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Holy cow. I call this the mad matchbook binding project of ‘07!
Over the last 3 days I’ve cut paper, cut covers, stapled and folded 36 matchbook
notebooks all are 2.5×3 inches and .5 inches thick. I cut myself through a 2-inch
thick stack of recycled fliers printed on one side and blank on the other. It’s
really thick nice paper, about 50 sheets per notebook. I’ve been using a few of
these from my last batch and I’ve got to say that they are really handy on a
number of levels; great for lists, notes, and passing phone numbers as well as
numerous other things.
36 of them, my hands are sore form cutting so much paper, a definite
nod to the fact that I need a paper sheer if I’m going to continue to work with
recycled paper.

Anyway, enjoy the pics, these will be headed to etsy tomorrow
or Sunday.

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Friday Friday Friday

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Friday’s are on of my favorite days of the week. It’s the start of the weekend and usually means that I’m going to have 2 days off in a row (not this week but we don’t have to talk about that!) But something new that I’ve found are d’blogala and the blog’s Art Journal Fridays! Every Friday the blog features a new writing prompt, and they are GOOD.  THey start with a basic premise- suck as "draw a grid on paper." Then the prompt turns to mroe specific, us whatever you want to decorate the grid with whatever you want. I love that kind of prompt.

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So now I have another thing on Fridays to look forward to!

originality in binding

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I wanted to write a little bit about originality. The topic came up on a discussion group I’m in because someone made a book with an unusual cover and someone else asked a related question using a related material. In this case the book was made with a cassette tape cover and the question was if one could use the actual tape to bind a book. Someone in the group responded immediately with the response of “Don’t make a cassette tape book, someone else in this group is already making one.”

First off I think the purpose of being in a group online is to gain ideas, learn new techniques and for inspiration. This person became INSPIRED by the previous poster’s materials and was using that as a springboard for their inspiration; in my mind exactly why one might join a group. Secondly, in terms of originality, we’re talking about a centuries old art/craft that is gaining a revival but that means that in some terms it’s all been done before. This wasn’t the first time I’ve seen a cassette tape book and I’m sure it won’t be the last. It’s been done before but that doesn’t mean that it can’t be done again in a new and original way. In this case- the 2 halves of the cassette were taken apart, attached to board and decorations placed on the board, original.

If I got my undies in a knot every time I saw a limp leather long stitch book, my feet wouldn’t have any circulation; ya know what I’m saying?  The simple fact is that when working with a centuries old art/craft you can’t get upset when you see something similar on the net. I’ve been putting my work online for over 6 years now and I’ve seen blatant rip offs of my patterns and designs, and I get pissed momentarily and realize that’s the permeability of the web, one of it’s great features. If I don’t want someone ripping off my design I shouldn’t put them up on the ‘net.  When I gain inspiration from someone I try and give them credit and I think that’s simply courtesy.

My main point is here is that bookbinding is a centuries old art/craft and essentially with the exception of a small handful of us, it’s all been done before. Even if you’re attaching something unusual to the covers of a book it’s been done. So can we all untwist our undies and get back to making and enjoying books?

 

covers

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I meant to post some pictures about my hard covered books,
showing the covers before attachment. So here ya go:

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This picture above is of the covers finished but not attached to a book block.

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This shows one of the covers "inside" before additional support is added to the spine. My favorite additional support is tyvek. But you could add a nice washi paper of any paper really and glue it in along the spine. Then glue in teh book block.

Martha Stewart has a Screw Punch- notes on a supply trip

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Martha Stewart has a screw punch. I couldn’t resist when I went to Michaels and I saw it. It’s larger than my wooden screw punch has a rubberized grip and storage in the handle for tips. In a few tests it’s slips through paper smoothly and without issue. It looks like the tips from my wooden screw punch should fit right into it. The large tips look as though they will cut through binder board with no issue but the smallest tip isn’t long enough. However if it will take a standard tip from Talas then no worries. At $24.99 it’s a good price, especially if standard screw punch tips fit it. The punch comes in a cardboard box, covered in brown paper with a clear plastic window to the inside. It closes up with a baby blue elastic.

It seems that Martha Stewart has a whole line of scrap booking and paper working supplies that are only available in Michaels stores. The line is completely coordinated with the other parts and pieces in the line. What does this mean for the average bookbinder and art journaler? Lots of possibilities. It would make it easier to coordinate pages, layers of paints and inks with papers and embellishments. It also means a higher price point. Anything “Martha” does comes with an additional price tag. But I’ll point out that the screw punch I bought was only $24.99, comes with it’s own storage, works really well and comes with 3 standard tips; not a bad deal overall.

I did notice that a lot of the paper by the piece at Michaels had changed. It looked as thought they had changed vendors or something of that nature. I was not as impressed as I have been in the past. Also the large stacks of paper that they have offered in the past have changed as well. This looks as though this is a repackaging by the vendor as it’s the same brand of paper but packages are different. They now offer 10 packs of a single style of paper, which is good but the colors are VERY limited and some of the other shade and styles that used to be offered in the large stack of 100 sheets have changed too. For someone like me who will buy 6 packages of card stock at a time this doesn’t bode well. I stocked up this time but I’m afraid the next time I go in things will be again different.

I didn’t stop at AC Moore this time out but the last time I was in I noticed a change in the layout of the store as well as the product in the store. Where Michaels is headed toward the higher end of the money chain AC Moore seems headed into the value end of the pool. There is no issue with value per se until it affects the quality of the products. I like value but I don’t like shoddy tools or supplies. They make the job of the artist and craft person harder. Not to mention that it devalues our work. People think that if they can head into their local craft store and buy supplies on the cheap that they should be able to buy the work of an artist or crafts person more cheaply than ever before.

I’ll end my rant now.

*note: I tested my old screw punch tips in the Martha Stewart punch it’s a no go. BUt it’s pretty close so I imagine that It will be super easy for me to make a small chuck that fits inside the handle and fits around the tip. A little thin brass tubing and a dremel and I’ll have a chuck that will fit my old tips as well as those form Talas.

leather…. black leather

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Let’s talk about leather, black leather, distressed bomber
jack brown leather and baby bottom smooth deer hide.  Well there’s not much to talk about really, other than it makes
some very sturdy notebooks, sketchbooks and journals that will survive time and
maybe even some serious abuse.

For awhile now I’ve spent a lot of time making recycled
journals and simple hedgehogs with wrap around covers there’s nothing wrong
with that as it keeps me making books but what I love to make are notebooks and
journals like these below:











The really beauty of a journal like this is that because of the style of its binding it can expand to hold a whole lot of stuff- odds and ends, paint, and emphemeria. The card stock pages are made to withstand abuse and  hold all the stuff someone might choose to glue on those pages. Even stuffe3d the strap and flap will wrap around the journal and hold it shut.

160 cardstock pages (110lb) wrapped in heavy smooth black cowhide, flap and strap closure, long stitch sewing style so that it expands to hold anything,  It will be on eBay starting tomorrow with a low buy it now price as well as an auction option.