Bookbinding: Books 1, 2, 3 & 4

Well, I finally got all four of these mostly done. Well, as much as I'm going to do. I have to redo a signature in the star one, the pages of the dark black one have to be trimmed down, and the other two have small problems that I'm never going to fix because they're my books and a little bit of weirdness doesn't bother me, even though it would have brought my grade down in my bookbinding class I took.

I really dislike how stressed I was during that class. I love books and I love making them, but I think I would have done a better job on these if I didn't have, "so what if this would have been marked wonky! I can do anything!" in my head like a mad woman. But now that I let that go through my system, I feel much better about bookbinding in general. Less likely to freak out.

Ok, it's me, I always freak out. But usually I'm not freaking out to please someone else, but me. I haven't done that in awhile. Art school did make me a lot more chill about mistakes. No. It had nothing to do with drugs. Ever. (seriously! I'm much to high on life to ever want to get into an 'altered state') But one thing art classes did teach me was that if I can paint something good once, I can do it again. It's better to wipe out something beautiful in the wrong place and put it where it needs to go than trying to paint around it!

Bookbinding class taught me to freak out again because I had no time to do assignments and make them as perfect as I wanted and yes, it would really mess up my grade. Not a good feeling to cultivate.

No! Don't take me the wrong way!

I'm not saying we shouldn't strive for getting it perfect, we should! I'm just saying this feeling of absolute panic and failure was a bad way to go about it. It didn't make the people who weren't going to try anyway get any better and it made people who were actually trying to learn and do beautiful books miserable and not want to do it.

If we were going to make "perfect books" right out of the gate, why bother joining the class?

In my painting classes my teacher could make someone with an admittedly bad painting (someone who was trying, but just couldn't get it right, not someone who didn't try) feel better at the end of a critique, have confidence that they could be better, and feel like trying again. The grade didn't matter but he was making people try harder!

I wish I would have been able to get that from bookbinding class... I'm working on it though!

Bookbinding: Book 1 & 2

I finished the red one last night and I just love it. Right now I'm sewing book three and hope to be done in an hour or so, but I'm getting a pretty rotten blister and it's making me go so slow! Book four won't take much time because it's only six signatures.

After that I've got another article I'm working on about why north lit studios are awesome and why kayak compasses confuse me. And I have done another article on the faux fauve palette, but I'm missing works that illustrate my point so I have to work on those. And I have a commission.

Whew!

Bookbinding: Books 2 & 3

Ok, so they aren't finished yet, but I love the papers I used for these! The book cloth looking stuff is not actually book cloth and both it and the paper are shiny! See the sparkly stars? And I love the dots on the red paper. I plan to buy more red paper if I run out of paper.

I'm glad I'm doing these because I'm remembering a bunch from class I had forgotten and learning some new stuff. When I actually make books that need to not be wonky I will be able to create them!

Bookbinding: Book 1

My first four books will be pretty much the same. I decided to bind my books using the Coptic stitch. I have four books for learning Urdu that I had forever in ebook format. Then I took a bookbinding course and decided I would find a program that would take a PDF and separate it into sections for bookbinding. I'll find the URL for that very handy little program tomorrow. So after that and the printing fiasco I ended up with forty or so signatures that needed to be sewn into books.

Yeah.

So now I'm actually getting to put them together. When I first started I wanted them all hard bound, but then I realized how hard that would be and how I was going to use them. I needed Coptic stitch so that they would stay flat, so I could study from them.

This was the first one. The cover really doesn't have anything to do with Urdu: An Essential Grammar, but I have a rule that I have to use up my art supplies I have for these projects I've started without buying more. That's also why half of the thread is pink and the other half is green.

I love it! Even if it would have gotten me a wonky stamp.

I'm doing these four first to get back in the swing of things, but after that I have enough supplies for several books I'm going to make, just to put in my etsy shop. I have gorgeous paper, an excellent book cloth and the paper for the inside will be up-cycled and top notch.

Bookbinding

Before I started doing art full time I started projects that I just didn't have the energy to finish after nine hours at work in 100+ temps and an hour and a half driving to and from work without air conditioning. It doesn't do a lot for creativity.

So now that I am painting and drawing full time I decided to finish projects I have hanging.

The first one is bookbinding. I have four books that only need to be sewn together. I was going to bind them hard back but, I decided it would be better for me to do them Coptic stitched.

The first one I ran out of pink cord and had to finish with green. It looks odd. But I made a rule that I'm not going to buy anything else until I finish my projects. And that book is for me! It is useful, not pretty.

After bookbinding I'm going to do my sewing projects. I need a rug in my studio and I want a few more longer shirts, or kameeze. I also want to do a quilt and just use up the large amount of fabrics I have still in my car.

Oh, I still have to sell my car...

Bookbinding: Post Binding

Of all the books I bound during my bookbinding class, the post bound one turned out to be my favorite. It was also the easiest to make! Seriously.

Basically I took long rectangular paper and made it all pretty and straight, then made the cover with four pieces of book board, some bookcloth, and some cute pieces of paper. Then drill pressed the sucker and added the posts to hold it all together. Easy! This one even had a flap that made it a tiny bit harder, but still, one more piece of bookboard, a longer piece of bookcloth, and some magnets isn't rocket science!

I'm going to try and make another like this soon, but using nicer paper. And making it thicker will be fun too! I was thinking cold pressed watercolor paper, or some paper I make! It will be a fun project any way I do it!