I've been busy...

Making books that is! Wow, can you believe three books in one post? Crazy, I know. And the thing is, there's another one I forgot to take pictures of before giving it away as thanks for the help I got with "Pride & Prejudice" formating. But here we have my most recent work.

A coptic binding guestbook/photo album for my cousins wedding. Their colors are stem green, black and white. On the front is a frame with a removable insert for putting a picture or label in. I used Arches cover weight for the inside, with decorative paper from Paper Source on the cover. Aprox. size is 8" x 8".




Next is a photo album I made from a kit from Paper Source again, as a wedding gift for my good friend Noelle. The inside is black cover weight interleaved with vellum. The cover paper is also from PS and I used black bookcloth on the spine. Aprox. size is 8" x 6".


And lastly, we have an accordion book I made just for fun, for my Mom's birthday. This is before it was fully completed, inside at least. I used more great paper from PS, with a periwinkle cover weight inside. I tied it closed with some purple grosgrain ribbon. I filled it with pictured of my Mom and our family. It was a fun little project to do. Aprox. size is 4" x 3".



Oh, and by the way, unfortunately I didn't make it into the exhibit in Chicago. Kind of a bummer, but I'd been wanting to bind this book for forever and I really enjoyed it.

Pride, Prejudice & Procrastination

This is a book I finally finished this week just in time to mail it off for an exhibit at the Chicago Public Library called "One Book, Many Interpretations". I was able to bind my all time favorite book, "Pride and Prejudice", by Jane Austen. I kind of have a problem with procrastination, but luckily it all came together in the nick of time, thanks to some help from my friend Matt with getting it formated for printing, as well as a briliant idea to use one of my shirts to cover the book, which turned out perfectly! Here's the binders statement I submited with the book and a little more info about it:

Book: 14.5 H x 12 W x 2.5 T (cm)
Title: Pride and Prejudice
Author: Jane Austen
Publisher: none, this is a Project Gutenberg E-Book that was printed on a laser printerDate and Place of Publication: June 1998 with Project Gutenberg (12th edition), http://www.gutenberg.org/
Description of Binding:Book: Yellow Dotted Swiss Cotton, laser printer paper, ink speckled edges. Packed Raised Cord sewing, Tight-Joint binding.
Box: Cream bookcloth, Italian decorative paper
Date Bound: July 2006
Binder's Statement: I wanted to create a representation of Elizabeth Bennet, the heroine of "Pride and Prejudice", in book form. I chose to do the book in a smaller size than expected because, like Elizabeth, you can't judge a package by it's size or appearance. The book, and Elizabeth, pack a powerful punch for something so small and delicate. I chose to cover the book in a fabric that Jane Austen, or Elizabeth would have worn themselves at the time, and the dotted-swiss brings further femininity to the binding. I also chose the packed raised cord binding for the book because it's ideas and principles are just a little "old fashioned" and I wanted to emphasize that through the structure. The box was more of an afterthought, but it captures the life a young lady such as Miss Bennet would have led, very crisp, clean, and although it may look fairly decorative, is actually quite useful, as Elizabeth was to all her acquaintances.

I will hopefully hear somtime in August if I made it into the exhibit. It opens in Chicago in September.

"Fathers and Sons"

I bound this copy of Ivan Turgenev's "Fathers and Sons" for a book club that I just joined. It's for my own personal use, so I just did a simple round spine binding on it. It is covered in green bookcloth and paper from Paper Source. The book was printed from Word in signatures of 4 folios each from this edition.



Yesterday I came home to a package from the Chicago Public Library that I've been waiting for and I'm so excited! I am entering an exhibit they are having later this year to celebrate 5 years of their "One Book, One City" program. They want submissions for the 10 different books they've done over the years so you had to request the one you wanted and guess what? I get to bind "Pride and Prejudice"!! The top 5 books for each title will be exhibited and there will be monetary prizes for the best of each title as well! I'm just so excited that I get to do Jane Austen. I was planning on binding this book anyway so now I have the chance to have it exhibited! They also sent me a reading copy of it, since I was one of the first to get my entry in, and it's a very nice hardbound copy. I'm not sure if I'm going to rebind that, or do my own, it depends on what I decide to do. It's not due until this summer but I've already started planning what I'm going to do. I'll be sure to share my progress as I go.

Camden "Flair"

This machine made graph paper journal was bound with Chocolate Bookcloth and Camden Fair Tiles on Red paper from Paper Source. Approx. size is 5 3/4" x 8 1/4".