Look at these beautiful hand bound, hand painted journals! This is what students made at Sunday’s workshop at the Guelph School of Art; Painted Longstitch/Linkstitch journals. If you’ve never been, this is a gorgeous, light filled studio on the 3rd floor of Wyndham Art Supplies in the heart of Guelph.
A big Thank You to everyone at Guelph School of Art, it’s always a pleasure teaching there.
If you missed out and want to join the bookbinding fun, I have more workshops coming up over the next couple of months. Go here to see what’s next.
For now, here’s my favourite part so far: sewing endbands from scratch! I think I’m drawn to the pearly sheen of the silk thread, the rich colours and the patterns for wrapping them. 
Last week I promised to continue with the series of posts about the Bradel Binding I was working on (last week was sewn headbands). I’m so thrilled to be able to use paper I marbled myself as the covers. 
This is what the vat looks like just before dipping the paper in. The washed-out design (with terrible ceiling reflections) is actually the paint sitting on top of the fluid. We had about 5 minutes to perfect our designs before the paint started falling into the vat, making it impossible to pick up on the paper. While this wasn’t my favourite design, I did learn a lot from each technique and can’t wait to try it again!
Just a simple single bead with silk thread onto a single core. Perhaps it’s because I get to use a needle and thread, or perhaps it’s because of instant gratification (no pressing or drying time!), but I really enjoy sewing headbands. It’s still fairly new to me, but I am hooked!
Sprouts Press 