totally fabricated

I’m working on some paper. (And at work i’m working on paperwork, but i’m also working on getting a job in a different line of work…). The paper of the moment is made of silk — kind of a blend of useful paper and artsy paper. Some of it will make very cool stationery. Some of it might become pages in a bit of a concept book. There are sticky wet pages scattered throughout the room. But shiny, pretty things are definitely allowed to be scattered around.

No pics of the silk paper just yet, but here are two of my favorite little books. A pair of friends and I start off the year every year by making books together out of various found materials. On the right is the one I made 2 years ago and used as a planner last year. The pages are Berkeley Bowl bags. The cover is 6-pack cardboard reinforced with duct tape. The spine is an old pair of jeans (with the handy zippered pocket on the front cover), and the red fabric is a bandana I found somewhere. It’s all glued together with homemade wheat paste.

On the left is this year’s book, currently serving as this year’s planner. I made a list of some of the attributes missing from previous books, and this one incorporated most of the ideal traits for a book: pretty bookmark (handspun indigo-dyed yarn), external pocket, internal pocket (large enough to carry around postcards for correspondence-related emergencies), a place to hold stamps, and handles. The handles were leftover from the paper bags one of my bookmaking-mates used for his pages.

The satisfaction of making books makes it worth the hours of effort, sewing together all that potential for writing and reflection, memories and things to remember….plus glueing things together is always fun.