Tell Your Own Story (in a handmade book)

My first book . . .

At the beginning of March I signed up for a free online series of workshops entitled Sketchbook Revival. Beginning in the middle of the month the workshop hosted 24 different workshops over 12 days, each on a different technique or topic to try in a sketchbook. As an avid Art Journaler, this sounded made for me; it also turned out to be perfect timing, coinciding with the covid outbreak and stay-at-home orders. But before the workshop even officially began, the host, Karen Abend, posted a fun video with one of the presenters on how to make your own art journal/sketchbook/whatever you want to call it from an old book. I’ve managed to overwhelm myself with online learning opportunities during our quarantine, so I haven’t made it to many of the workshop sessions yet — but I jumped right on making my own book.

Given my love of books and paper in general, repurposing old stuff, making, journaling, sketching . . . it’s probably not surprising that I’m drawn to handmade books. This type involves removing the block of pages from an old — unused, damaged, gathering dust (I know some people are sensitive about “defacing” books so I want to insert a disclaimer), book and stitching new pages to the spine. A little book making terminology for you: book paper is gathered into folded packets called “signatures” and then the signatures are sewn or glued to the spine. A book usually consists of multiple signatures. I chose different kinds of blank paper, as well as some of the original text, for my signatures so the pages would work well for sketching. Often with this kind of handmade book people like to use a huge variety of printed, marked on, multi-textured papers that they will then further alter in a so called “junk journal”.

The Gentleman’s Companion Exotic Drink Book repurposed as an art journal.

This was my first time with repurposing, or salvaging, an old book to make a new one; the first book I made was originally intended as a card — and grew. In 2017 one of my aunts was very ill and required multiple hospitalizations. I wanted to send her my love and concern, but a card didn’t seem adequate. I thought, "well I’ll make a card” and then “no, I’ll make a book”. I’d always wanted to try making a book and now I had a purpose. I made three single page signatures from heavy watercolor paper and bound the signatures together with a very simple stitch (that still took me lots of practice). I attached the bound signatures to chipboard pieces covered in fabric from a vintage tablecloth for the covers. The pages were filled with tiny watercolors, bits of sheet music and old textiles, rubber-stamped text and simple stitching. I hadn’t looked at the pictures of this little book since I sent it off, revisiting it for this blog I realized that I really love it.

The first page of the book reads “wishing you all the best things like . . .” and the following pages illustrate some simple pleasures.

Last fall I watched artist Caterina Giglio make a teeny tiny book with twigs as the spine on youtube (see here). I decided to try this technique as a gift book for my God daughter’s birthday in lieu of a card. Anna is a math major (I think that’s right, anyway, she’s great at math) at the University of Wisconsin. I found a quote about math by Galileo and used that as the theme for a tiny book that is mostly collage with some stamping for text. The signatures are heavy card stock, each sewn to a twig with the twigs stitched together.

One final entry in “Books I Have Made” — the little journal below is made from a grocery bag and was a little experiment I used as a kind of art warm up when we moved back into our house after a major remodel in 2018. The journal is loosely inspired by some of my favorite romances in books and allowed me to play with all kinds of techniques and materials I hadn’t used in a while. For these pages I cut pieces of paper grocery bags to the size I wanted and then layered them together, printed sides facing each other on the inside, with glue. I ran a brayer over the pages multiple times to force out excess glue which I wiped off with a paper towel, and then let them dry under heavy books overnight. Using grocery bags as the basis of your handmade book is a very economical (and green) method; it’s a great material for first attempts — you truly have no fear of “messing up” when you’re working on a grocery bag. The pages are also heavy-duty and will stand up to layers of painting and collage.

Would you like to give it a try? Here’s a short video that shows how to do a pamphlet stitch on a small grocery bag book with two or three single signatures. It really is quite simple. Mother’s Day is coming up, Hallmark is closed for who knows how long — here’s a way to send a very personal “thinking of you”.

Supplies like those used in the video can be found on Amazon. This is a good kit for beginners.