Day 12/365
A glimpse of the tidiest corner of the studio mid-prep for the busy holiday season that is, gasp, just around the corner!!
I’ve already sewn these text blocks, next I’ll make the covers and then case them in. There’s a nice surprise of page materials and the covers are full bookcloth (made by me!), I’m pretty excited for these journals!
Day 11/365
Next weekend is the Coptic Bookbinding Class I’ll be teaching at the Arts Market on College! This is a great hands-on class that teaches how to make a really nice hard cover journal. Participants will leave with a finished journal, made from scratch!
I personally love the coptic binding for its immediacy as a non-adhesive binding (we will be pasting covers though, but the binding itself is non-adhesive). Once the basic stitch is learned there are many variation possibilities, making this a very versatile binding technique.
It’s a great way to get started on personalized holiday gifts, too.
It runs on Sunday, October 26 11:30am – 2:30pm. Go here to learn more and see how to register, or check out my workshops page for other upcoming dates.
Day 10/365
No, this isn’t really all of my journals. It’s just the most organized-looking photo of some of my favourites and currently in-use journals. What I want to talk about today are some of the uses of my journals, maybe they’ll inspire you too!
Some of these are books that I’ve handbound, and others are books I’ve collected over the years, from other hand binders. There are several from Italy (Florence, Venice and Rome), and many from other binders here in Toronto and across Canada. I feel I should come clean and admit that I don’t use all of them. A few are in the queue to replace books with only a few blank pages left.
While I have journals for: ideas, to-do lists, sketches, favourite quotes, dreams, ramblings and other categorized observations, I usually have one daily journal. This is the one that goes everywhere with me, fits in my purse, is rugged and tough yet beautiful enough that I sometimes use it as ‘advertising my craft’ when out on the town. It’s also the test-run of my new indigo journals and is pictured above.
It’s pretty liberating to have this book as a catch-all for everything, no stress about perfect penmanship, clean sketches or having the best ideas. I use it for everything: to-do lists, measurements of projects, contact information, ideas, sketches. It’s a lovely snippet of this time in my life. Looking back on my other, older, daily books, it’s interesting to see what my focus was at the time, what my inpirations and dreams were all about.
If you have a book that you really love and want to use but just aren’t sure, this is where I suggest to start; a book of plenty. I’d love to hear how it goes!
Day 9/365
I’ve been working on hand dying papers with indigo over the last few weeks, both in my own studio and at Paperhouse Studio here in Toronto. 
After a bit of trial and error I’ve been able to turn the papers into things like this lovely journal aptly titled: ‘Indigo Journal No.1’. I think it’s my favourite book in my shop right now. It’s a handy sized journal, it’s thick with pages so I won’t use it up that quickly and I love the white-indigo blue-brown colour scheme. Also, the texture of the washi paper covers is delightful!
There are more projects in the works for these papers, so keep your eyes peeled!
Day 8/365
Day 7/365
I am a bookbinder, I hand bind blank books.
I also use books; as journals, sketchbooks, idea books, for to do lists, for a bucket list . . you get the idea – I use a lot of books. But this is my world, it’s what surrounds me and it’s my everyday. Many times I’ve heard people say that they never use their journals and wish this wasn’t so. The books I make are meant to be used and well-loved; write in them, sketch in them, spill tea on them and yes, even rip out the pages if you really want to! It’s your journal!!
But before I get totally carried away with my artsy-fartsy book arts ideas, I’m going to back up to the beginning, to the start of a creative journey. I’ve decided to write a few posts about actually using the journals I make and how to get started.
So, today’s tip is: plein air. Yup, that’s it: plein air. It roughly translates to: ‘in the open air’, from the 19th century style of painting outdoors and one of the main components to French Impressionism. I also think of plein air as having a strong sense of open air, or open space.
In the context of this post and sketching or journalling, I think of it as starting with a clean slate, in a space that is open. For me, that might mean actually going outside, to the local park to sketch, going on a hike, or to a corner coffee shop to people watch and do a bit of writing. I think it comes down to the idea of clearing my mind and letting inspiration come from the moment, my surroundings. I find that physically removing myself from my studio/office and all the ‘to dos’ gives my creativity breathing room. I realize that this isn’t always possible; clearing off a desk or table top can have the same effect! Give it a try, I’d love to hear how it goes!
I’ll be posting more ideas for using Sprouts Press handbound books as the weeks go on, stay tuned!
ps. The photo above is from an amazing cottage trip near Algonquin Park in Ontario. This is not my local park (I wish!), but I spent a lot of time on that bench sketching. When I cannot get out to sketch or journal, I go on memories like this one.
Day 6/365
This Thanksgiving (Canadian Thanksgiving, that is) I’ve got an awful lot to be thankful for. I’ll be thinking of everyone who has supported me on my journey – Thank You!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Day 5/365
This is my studio on a less-busy sunday, a happy little corner of creativity. Just some regular ol’ bookbinding going on, some tea-drinking and what not. A nice sunday indeed!
Day 4/365
This is one of my most favourite projects to date. It’s something I thought about for a long time before making it, mulling over it’s possibilities and the best way to craft it that accurately captured what I had in mind.
It’s a lovely Florentine cover watercolour journal, complete with leather implements holder. I love that the leather wrap around is a layered, pieced-together band, reminiscent of a quilt. You can even see the button holes from the reclaimed leather’s previous life as a garment.
This was a unique, one of a kind project and it sold a long time ago, but I think of it often.
Day 3/365
For a few weeks now I’ve been playing around with paper dying using indigo. But before I started using real indigo I did many tests with watercolour paints (indigo-colour, of course) and I wanted to share some of my favourites with you.
I cannot stop thinking of blue and white ceramics when I look at this one, the pattern is lovely!
The resulting papers are lovely but they just aren’t the same depth and richness of colour as true indigo-dyed papers. I’ll go over some of the things I made with the true indigo dyed papers in a few days. And at some point in the future I’ll do a post about the actual hand-dying process and how messy/fun it really is!!
Sprouts Press 