Blog

This weekend I was in the mood to make a journal.  My general journal is one that I have two pages for each week of the year.  It’s text and images on white pages with the date; it’s my way of documenting what’s going on during the year.  I’ve written such journals such being a teenager, although I tossed many old ones which I now regret.

I bought “Creative Wildfire” by L.K. Ludwig and decided to make a journal based on one of her examples.  From her idea, the base of the pages are paint chip cards from the local hardware store.  I removed the paint chips, sanded down the cards, painted a layer of gesso on one side of each, and then glue two sheets together, gesso side out, as they felt a bit flimsy to me.  I then used acrylic paints to paint both sides of the paper.  The pages are a bit sticky, something I was trying to avoid.  Next time I’ll be sure to scrap more paint off (or use less to begin with).  I’ll probably use the book for prints of photos and other misc. writing.  On one spread below, I have a print of a butterfly resting on the center of an open spread. Making the book gave me a much needed sense of getting something going as I’ve been in a creative slump for the past several weeks.

Here’s the book that I used for inspiration.  She shares a lot of cool ideas, inspiration, and enjoyable interviews with other artists.

Making Handmade Books: 100+ Bindings, Structures & Forms by Alisa Golden is a good one for different types of ways to sew books together.

Another that I like is Gwen Hiehn’s “Real Life Journals: Designing & Using Handmade Books.”  Both this book and L.K. Ludwig’s book includes extras.  In Ludwig’s book, there is a blank journal book included within an envelope attached to the inside back cover.  It’s made from scraps from the print run of the book.  Clever.  In Gwen’s book, the inside front cover includes a pocket with a booklet called “Choose your own bookbinding adventure,” and the inside back cover has a larger envelope with a fold out sheet called “Bookbinding essentials.”  For punching holes into a signature (a folded set of pages), a great tip is using an open telephone book to rest the pages into.