new stuff

Well, after systematically searching through every room in my house I still haven't found my camera. This only leaves the attic un-thoroughly searched, because its impossible to thoroughly search through piles and piles of half opened half unlabeled boxes whilst balancing on a plank and trying not to fall through the ceiling below. So, fingers crossed for it being in there then.

I finally realised though, that working in an art college does have its advantages, and I borrowed a shiny brand-spanking-new posh one from the photography department (if only I didn't have to take it back tomorrow...)

Which brings me to the subject of today's post: new stuff!


I've been slowly making things for a week or so now, in spare minutes snatched here and there, and after a photo shoot (rock and roll) this afternoon I've listed them in my shop at last. I'd forgotten how time consuming listing on Etsy is, all the hard decisions like postage cost and picture order (and price!) so there's more to come in the next few days; more books, a box some photo albums and some prints too, I'm excited :)

It feels good to get back into making again, and after getting all excited and coming up with new ideas and playing with new materials I decided to get back to basics (as it were) and make some simple case bound books, and really try to concentrate on making them as good as possible. The book you see above is the one of the results of that process... I used some beautiful new book cloth I bought, and some paper from the pile I normally won't use in case I muck it up. I took it slow. I hand sewed the headbands and inlayed some of the paper on the front, and a little bit on the back too... And looking at it now this book feels slightly different to my usual style, a shift perhaps, towards decoration and pattern, towards simplicity maybe, towards tradition (or at least the tradition of making books to last...) It feels quiet in my hands. You can see more pictures here


There's also some more little notebooks in the shop. These are such fun to make, each one a slightly different combination of screen printed tree covers. And really, I needed an excuse to test out the new corner rounder at work...

As a thank you to you all for putting up with me moaning on about dust and lost possessions for the last however many months, and to celebrate the fact I've actually made some books (hurray) I'm going to give some books away :) The three little books you see above are slightly different from the ones in the shop as they have all four corners rounded instead of two (slight over exuberance with the corner rounder on my part) but I still think they might be useful, and if not then they've still got pretty pictures of trees on them to look at. So, if you think you would like them, just leave a comment before the end of Friday, I'll pick a random winner and post them off to you on Monday morning, what do you think?