More books

Here are some more of my hand made journals I've made in the past couple of years. I wish I had taken photos of them before using, but at least they withstood all the wear and tear.

My hand made books

I've been making hand made books and my own journals for about 4 years. Here are some of the ones that started it all:

This was an early book representing the progression of time. I took photos of an apple from the beginning through every bite until the end when it's just a core. I chose decorate paper that would help illustrate this idea. Sew with the regular Coptic stitch.

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This is a closed spine book, more along the lines of a regular hardcover book.

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Another Coptic stitch book, this one is only 2 inch by 1 1/2 inch!

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Even smaller at only 1 inch by 1 inch is this accordion fold out book. It looks like a normal little book, but if you take out the holder in the spine, the whole thing accordions out.

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Another regular Coptic stitch, but the paper covering the book was made by...yep, me! It also has a recessed window in the front if you wanted to put a plate or photo there. (none shown)

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For a major project, I custom made a photo book for myself that I could bring to the darkroom. When I do my photography, I have to write a ton of information down in a neat and orderly fashion. With the book i customized for my particular process, it made things run a lot smoother. I used the hard cover binding method here to give my the most coverage and durability.

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Inspired by "Army of Darkness", I made the Necronomicon, a book of the dead, bound in flesh and written in blood. It's pretty hard to come by flesh these days and I did want to book to be somewhat archival, so I found a paper that looked just flesh. Around this time is when i decided to go explore more obscure stitching techniques when I came upon the Caterpillar stitch. It looked like veins going through the board, binding it all together. Creepy, cool and perfect. Once I learned this stitch, it quickly became my favorite.

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A small Caterpillar stitch, pocket size. Once a stitch is learned, there are endless possibilities of what can be done. I always try to make something different, see what happens.

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This was a functional journal that I made, one of many to come. The Caterpillar stitch was my favorite for a while, still may be, but it's difficult to do.

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This was a gift I made for someone. That was one of the reasons i continued to make books, for giving them as special gifts. Books are extremely hard to make, they take a lot of blood, sweat and tears, but there is nothing like that one of a kind gift that leaves someone feeling completely special. It's worth it.
I worked very hard on these covers giving them a psychedelic feel while still remaining feminine with the pink velvet material. Once again I used the coptic stitch, always neat, secure and classic.

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