Was playing around with nature printing the other day and since there are lots of pine trees out back here and I like them very much, I was using some small branches to make prints with.

I used white gouache paint, watered down to the consistency of single cream, to do the printing - I like it to be thick enough to give a bit of texture, as well as pattern. I pressed it down onto Somerset Velvet paper - the newsprint grey shade, which has a lovely feel to it. The result is quite subtle, but I rather like that.

I decided to use the print as a book cover and since I wanted the whole project to have a natural simplicity about it, I decided to use an uncomplicated and soft binding. I therefore used two folios inside and stitched it as above with natural linen thread - well waxed, of course.

This is the front cover of the little journal once it was complete. Wonder what I could use for printing with next - Hmm lots of nice fallen leaves around .....

Since yesterday was the first Sunday of the month (November already - how scary is that!) I went into Aix to visit the monthly market of old and secondhand books, held in the Place de l'Hotel de Ville. I sauntered around the various stalls - nothing really grabbed me until the very moment I was about to leave when this bundle of architects blueprints from the beginning of last century caught my eye.

They seem to be the work of a firm called "Etablissements Tricotel", based at Asnieres in Paris. Aren't they great! Such a wonderful colour and the designs are beautiful - ranging from the Hotel de la Poste in Rouen, to Mme Cornu's rustic garden furniture. I wish I knew how these were made - if you know perhaps you could let me in on the secret.

Of course the idea behind purchasing them was to use them in some of my bookbinding endeavours, so I made this simple little pamplet yesterday evening, just cos I couldn't wait to see one made up - I am rather impatient sometimes! Here are a few more close-up photos of the finished article.

Wonder how many of the projects that were constructed have lasted as long as the blueprints?

Towards the end of summer a friend came to visit for a week of creative activity, involving inks, paint, paper, thread, and various items from the park out back. Below is one of the lovely creations that she made during her stay - beautiful, isn't it?

Anyway, I decided to see if I could adapt this idea to make some kind of binding, even though this would be more decorative than practical. My first attempt (not shown) was a bit wibbly wobbly, since it was held together only with the warp threads of the weaving.

Consequently the journal pictured here is my second attempt, where I sewed the folios onto tape initially and then did the loom part afterwards.

Although it was just a bit of fun, and wouldn't really stand up to any rough treatment, I was rather pleased with the end result. Now I will have to weave some thoughts together to grace its pages.

I was enjoying making the Japanese Kangxi bindings the other day, when it dawned on me, that it would be fun to use postcards as front covers for some of these little notebooks.

I don’t know if you are like me, but I suspect you might be - and in that case you will have quite a large pile of cards and postcards that you have gleaned from your trips to art galleries, museum shops etc, or you have picked up some of those free publicity postcards you find in cafe’s sometimes, or kept cards sent to you by friends and family.  Anyway, you always think - oh that’s an interesting image, I will take that and do something with it later.  Well this is the something that I finally decided to do and I thought you might like to try it too.

I looked for front cover cards that were A6 or slightly larger and then trimmed them to size, I also cut a plain card of the same size for the back cover and folded some A5 paper in half to make the text block of the book, making sure to keep all of the open sides at the spine edge of the notebook.

Then you simply make a template for marking the holes and pierce right through the book after aligning the pages and cover and using a clip to keep them in place.All that is left to do now is to do the stitching which is really quite simple, provided you make the holes large enough to accommodate the thickness of the needle and strong thread you intend to use. 

If you are unsure about the method of stitching there are various little tutorials for Japanese stab bindings on youtube.com, you can check them out here or you could treat yourself to a copy of the book “Japanese Bookbinding” by Kōjirō Ikegami, which I find to be an excellent, well illustrated manual with clear step by step instructions for all sorts of Japanese bindings.

Hope you enjoy using up your stash of postcards!

What can you make out of bits and bobs such as these? The answer is an expanding sketchbook journal - and the lovely thing about it is that you can incorporate whatever takes your fancy.

I was commissioned to make this particular binding in lovely neutral papers and I find the resulting journal very pleasing, tactile and intriguing at the same time.

It is in fact a type of concertina binding as you can see, with Codex sewn into both the mountain and the valley folds of the pleated spine.  The ribbon is added to give some stability and to stop in from expanding completely out of control!

Although you can, of course keep adding to it as you wish by sewing in extra drawings or collaging more or less indefinitely.

This one includes double pages for landscape drawings/images,

little envelopes for keeping your treasures safe,

and sewn pocket flaps for tucking in any interesting small items.

My hope for this little journal is that is will be well used and well loved, and that it will become more and more precious as it is further customised and personalised. It's a far cry from Moleskine, but me I kind of prefer it.

As you can see, I have been doing quite a lot of binding this past week. Quite a pile of it, in fact.

I had been loathe to cut into my treasured sheets of handmade Washi, (some of which I showed in my previous post), they were so beautiful - several of them even looked like they were lit from within and the closer I looked at them, the more special they became. However, at the beginning of the week, I decided to make a start, and having begun, I just couldn't stop. 

Each time I completed one, I thought "Oh, I wonder what this paper would look like once it was bound - they were so pleasing to look at, to hold and to use. The notebook above shows the Kangxi variation on the Four-Hole Binding.

This green and pink one with the lovely gold splashes is the Hemp-Leaf binding, or asa-no-ha toji, to give it its correct Japanese name.

These binding look deceptively simple, but require a lot of accurate work, in order to achieve a good standard of finish. I think I will need to make quite a few more, before I achieve anything even approaching the Japanese sample I have.

Ah well, I can always dream. One of the aesthetics espoused by Japanese Design - "Bukkyo" - refers to constant refinement and improvement. So I guess I shall just have to bind a whole heap more :-)