Tag Archives: handmade

Book Board

I made a few covers book board and paper from my stash of decorative papers. I made them to specifically cover hedgehog book blocks. So each cover is 3.5×5.5 inches and the spine is .75 inches thick.

To go with these covers I made some paper covered hemp cored headbands. These are glue on style and you probably can’t see them in the pictures, but they are there. I used dark red/burgundy colored washi paper. I used it because it’s thin, glues easily and I knew would wrap around the hemp cord with ease. I also knew that once it was glued up it would become stiffer than it was before and even with that the washi would absorb glue easily as I stuck it to spines. I’ve seen several other methods of making end/head bands before with fabric, paper and one I particularly liked was one that uses ribbon.

I’m listing one of these to etsy, one to ebay and keeping one.

This one will go on eBay.

The one above is mine. 🙂

This is a shot of all the other covers that I’ve made. I"m pretty happy with how they came out now I need to make some more bookblocks. 🙂

Big Leather Journals

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This week I finished 5 more journals. 4 are going up to my etsy account and one is going to eBay. All are smythe sewn- the style of moleskines. So I start with the book block, stitch it, then glue it and clamp it. Then that book block is glued into a cover.

For these I decided to make covers with flaps and straps instead of elastics. I thought it would be a nice deviation from what I’ve been doing. I’m particularly fond of the distressed brown leather. I like to call the color Choco-Latte, because it’s the color of coffee or milk chocolate.

The 4 below are the books on etsy. They are on there for $24.99 plus shipping via priority mail.

Links to notebooks and sketchbooks

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After a mad dash of posting to etsy the graph paper jotters and sketchbook hedgehogs are up!

If you want to see a mad crazy amount of pictures of them head over to my flicker page here.

recap of this week in the studio

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Phew it’s been a busy week here at Comfortable Shoes Studio. I’ve been crazily busy with the DayJob as well as in the studio. Yup, fresh new books. I’ve got a stack of graph paper jotters, a group of cardstock hedgehogs, a couple of kraft paper hedgehogs and a 100% cotton hedgehog all headed for etsy.

I’ll post links to etsy when I get them loaded up. I’m pretty excited to get some leather books back up to etsy, it’s been awhile and the recycled notebooks seemed to be taking over my shop. While I was in the studio I cut several large notebook sized covers from this chunk of sleek black cowhide I’ve got, they will be fantastic with either white or red stitching…. Keep an eye out for those too. I’m going to work on designing the spines today.

Here are some pics to occupy you until then:

Yes, that is graph paper

Use of a notebook from the horse’s mouth

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I occasionally get feedback from people who buy my books on how they like them, use them and things I could do better. I got one a few days ago from someone who buys my books on eBay and uses them as I do on a regular basis. Here’s what he had to say:

Leslie: I worked Saturday till
3AM, then tonight till midnight. A GREAT HELP was one of your jotter
notebooks. I was formulating a new *** ****** product our company
already has orders for. Moving between the lab and the warehouse,
applying the stuff, making observations and changes, and with all the
junk sitting around, it was impossible to use a full-size notebook to
write in. The jotter was perfect, and everything involving the new
chemical that arrived on Friday is in that little book–which would be
worth a pretty penny to a few people I know of. — D

I love getting emails like that. First it tels me I’m doing something right with my books and tells me that I’m not the only one who uses my little notebooks regularly. OKay so I use it like I’m addicted to it, but I’m okay with that.

He’s using one of these:

But maybe in a different color.

Maine Vacation Journal

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Earlier this year I went to Maine to visit my family and take a brief vacation from work. I had made a sketchbook filled with 140lb 100% cotton paper. It was awesome to work with, the combination of the paper and the handmade book made it easy to draw what I wanted to and add the color I wanted. See below for few pictures of the book.

New Jotters

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I don’t have pictures yet but I bought more graph paper, so I made a metric ton of graph paper jotters. They came out great. I also stitched up a lot of blocks for hedgehogs- 8 with 65 lb super stiff cover stock in cream, 120 pages in 6 signatures. The blocks came out really nice. Later this week I’ll be gluing them up and cutting covers.
I’m also working on some of the journals I used to make- leather with paper backing and super nice paper inside. Yeah baby. I’ll get some pics up tomorrow.

PIpe Clamp Book press

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The book press below might not be pretty but I’m sure it’s plenty serviceable and would give anyone the amount of pressure they need to press up a few hedgehogs. I found it on this website. And it’s currently for sale.

It’s made from a pipe clamp- readily available from any woodworking store or big box building store like Home Depot. Most pipe clamps can be bought in the pieces and you then buy the pipe to mount the clamping pieces and the system works through leverage. After sliding the top clamp into place you then screw the turn screw to create the tight pressure. Because you can buy pipe in any length this is a great design to work with- the only limit to the stack is how high you want to go. I wouldn’t suggest going over 16 inches, but that’s a lot of books. Hurrah for a binder thinking outside the box and making something that works, is relatively inexpensive and provides more than enough clamping pressure for the home binder.

Jotters Loaded up to eBay

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I just loaded this set of 6 jotters up to eBay. Each has 48 pages made of Wausau pastels 24lb paper in ivory color. The covers are made from advertising posters that are coated in vinyl. These posters advertised Easter dinners. The colors are pale yellow, pinks and some light green. Low starting bid and a low buy it now price. Made 100% by hand.

Gorgeous HandMade Sketchbooks

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So I’ve been browsing the internet looking at sketchbooks and what people do with them and I found this site! Holy cow! The writer and artist has an obsession with all things French and sweets. After you check out the pages about her sketchbooks start and the beginning and read back- it will make you hungry for sweets of the delicate and rich French variety.

Look at that gorgeous marbled paper! Fantastic!