May 2015 Week 8ish - Cover and Assemble

Hello Everyone,

It has been a long week with a touch of sadness for me and my family, as our dog passed away from cancer.

But I was able to finally finish the Layered Cut Paper book and so below is how I made the cover and assembled the book.

For the cover,  I used black book cloth, PVA glue, pieces of mat board (general everyone says to use gray or Davy board, but I have a lot of smaller scrap mat board pieces that have been sitting around), a couple of very heavy books that will be used as weights.

First, I cut the book cloth to the appropriate size.  In this case, it was  12" x 18".  For the corners, you need to lay the boards out and cut at a diagonal about 3/16ths of an inch from each corner.

Once you add the glue to the book cloth it is very hard to make changes.  So, after the book cloth is cut and before you start gluing, you will want to check to make sure you measured correctly.  If you fold over the cloth and it seems short, it is easier to start over and re-cut a new piece of book cloth.  You can save the short piece to use on another project.  If you fold over the cloth and it seems too long you can easily trim what isn't needed.

When you start gluing, you will want to always work from the middle out.  And you need to work carefully, cleanly and quickly.

For the Corners, you will want to glue one side down and then run a bone folder over the edge, as follows:

It creates a flattened tuck.  When you fold the other side up it will be a neat corner.

After the cover was glued, I put it under the heavy books for a day or two to dry and flatten.


After it was dry, I added the lettering to the front of the cover.  Using a print out of the type from my computer.  I transferred it on to the book cloth by taking a light colored pencil and coloring the back of the paper.  Then I carefully used a stylus to go over the lettering.

after transfer before adding the gold

Using a gold pen, I carefully painted each letter.  And added a gold stripe.

Next I added the end papers to the inside of the cover.

I did take the tag off the paper before I glued it. :)

Finally, I glued in my pages.  Making sure I aligned the pages, so that the spine is open and the pages will sit on the table without having to be suspended.

And here is the completed book!

Just as a note, I was planning on adding some sewing on the pages.  I decided not to.  I think it would have looked too busy.  Adding the color was enough.

Also, it will need to be put under weights for a few days, to help the pages flatten out.


For next month, I have already decided to do a much simpler book.  It will be a folded 16 page, single sheet book.  I will give more information about it in the next post.

Until then,

Happy Book Binding!

Sheila

This post is dedicated to my beloved, Arthur.  He will truly be missed!

May 15, 2015 - Week 6

Hello Everyone,

Finally!  I finished the cutting, coloring and pasting of the interior pages.  Here's some pictures of the process.

Finished pages before coloring

I do like the look of the plain white page cut-outs, so I will make a version of the book in that style.

Since I was unable to run the pages through a printer, I had to had draw all the lettering using a light table to ensure everything was straight and consistent.

I colored the pages by using Caran d'Ache Crayons and water.  I did this before gluing the pages together to make it easier to handle.

Before gluing, I made sure I knew what direction the pages need to go in.  This book structure calls for the content to be front, back, front, back of the concertina folds.

I am not exactly happy with the color, so I'm thinking I will alter it a bit.  The other problem can be seen below.  And that is where the pages are attached is very visible in the back side of the book.  which would be ok, except I put the page key on the wrong side.  I would prefer not to have to redo those pages, so I'm going to spend some time coming up with a solution for that problem too.

Next week, I will post about the solutions and also a demo of making the book cloth that I will use for the cover.

Until then,

Happy Book Binding!

Sheila

May 4, 2015 Week 5 Book Show

Hello Everyone,

I'm still working on cutting the pages for last month's book.  I am hoping that I will be able to make a post about it later this week.

In the meantime,  if you happen to be in the Wauwatosa Wisconsin area, stop by the Library on 76th and North.  Nancy Lohmiller, J. Michael Tucci and I have books on display in the 2nd floor wall cases.  (photos below)  There are lots of different book forms represented and I was able to put in many of the books from the blog.

We will also be doing a book demonstration on Wednesday, May 20th from 1 to 3 pm.  I plan on demonstrating the Hedi Kyle Diagonal Fold Pocket Booklet.  It should be a lot of fun.

Check it out if you get a chance.

Hopefully, I'll be back later in the week with progress on the Layered Cut Paper book.

Happy Book Binding!

Sheila

April 2015 Week 4 - Content

Hello Everyone,

Well, I missed last week.  Not because I wasn't working on the book, but because what I was doing took more time than I had originally thought it would.  Such is the way of things though.

So I do believe this book will need to be a two month project.

I did want to share what I have done so far though.  And it has mostly been the cutting to size of the paper and folding the concertina.

If you have trouble getting your concertinas and accordions to fold properly without being off, here's a quick tip to try.

When you begin to fold the paper into the sections, first make a very light score line where you want the fold to be:

don't score too heavily, otherwise the paper will automatically fold at that line.  The light score mark helps the paper fold where you want it, but allows for adjustment to make sure the pages line up properly.

Then when you begin to fold the paper line up the edge of the paper with the paper underneath.  See below:

Once you have everything lined up fold and press with a bonefolder.



After I had my paper folded into the concertinas, I then traced my template on to the paper.

Now, it's just a matter of cutting out all the shapes, which requires time, patience and a very sharp knife.  Since the paper is much thicker than the template paper, it is taking much longer.  I think in the end it will be worth it.

Here's what I have so far:

I'm going to continue working and will return next week with what was accomplished.

Until then,

Happy Book Binding!

Sheila

April 2015 Week 2 - Content

Hello Everyone,

Well, I do believe Spring has finally made it to Milwaukee and that always lifts everyone's mood.  I was asked today if I lost weight and I had, about 5 pounds of layers.

Now to this month's book.  The Layered Cut Paper Book.  As I stated last time, I wanted to start by making actual size templates for all the pages.   This helps work out any drawing or composition problems that might come up.  And since I am making the templates out of printer paper, it's easier to cut through, so there's less time involved.  One not so good part of using cheap printer paper though, is that the templates are fragile, so they won't hold up to many tracings.

Doing cut paper images requires lots of patience, but once you get into it, it becomes very meditative.

As you can see, I did try to simplify and pattern the different cells.  I tried to use shapes and patterns that could easily be done as cut shapes.  If you have not done cut paper before, it does require a few attempts to determine what needs to be cut out.  And sometimes it's just a matter of trial and error.

Also when you are working with such simplistic shapes, design becomes extra important.  The design principles I always come back to are Scale and Proportion and Variety and Variation.  As they say "Variety is the spice of life!"  So when I'm drawing out my designs I always try to remember "big and little, short and long, fat and skinny, curvy and straight".

I also worked out my solution for adding the needle work.  It was here that I decided I will be do a concertina folded structure with the needle work as decorative edge.

I would have loved to make the pages separate and have the needle work be the binding but, as you can see from my attempt at it below, it would require more construction and time then I currently have.

the reject - I decided it was the wrong way to go after only a few stitches

So I'm going to stick with what works for now.  I will stick this idea in my mental catalog and I might return to one day.


For next week, I will do a demo of the construction of the concertina fold and how I join sections together.  I will also demonstrate the cutting of the actual images.

Till then, Happy Spring! and

Happy Book Binding!

Sheila

April 2015 Week 1 - The Introduction

Hello Everyone,

I did a bit of introduction to my next book in my last entry, but I'll review and expand on it for this one.

My next book is going to be a Layered Cut Paper book.  The theme is "Geometric Area" and the content I'm going to create is different cell structures of the human body, simplified and abstracted down to create a cut paper design.  7 panels - hair, skin, fat, blood, muscle, bone, nerve

Here's my sketch:

After having thought about the cover and what not, I decided I will need to add another panel to the front, so that it can be attached to the cover.  

The panels will start at 9" and will decrease by one inch for each panel.  I will keep the width the same for each panel.  So, if my math is correct the paper I will need for this book is 51"x 7".  Since I don't have a piece of paper that size, I will need to piece the paper together.  

I am planning on using a heavy weight paper.  Most likely it will be 300lb. hot pressed water-colour paper.  I want to emphasize the cut paper and the geometric structure and the thickness of the paper will add a nice dimension to each panel.

The blue and red lines indicate some hand stitch work I would like to add, representing the veins.  I have been wanting to include some stitching in my books and this seems like the perfect time to do so.  

I will also add a bit of color to the panels - 

going from a yellow brown, lighter brown, yellow, orange, red/pink, light brown, blue brown.  I want to keep the colour muted and light, so that it's not prominent.

The cover will be similar to the one I used for the "Myths of Colors" book.  I would love to do something with vellum for the cover, but I haven't quite thought that all the way through yet.

I plan to start by creating an actual size template for each panel. 

For next week content post, I will, hopefully, show my finished templates, the paper I will be using, how I am attaching the pages together (maybe using the stitching?) and any other problems or solutions that come up.

Until then,

Happy Book Binding!

Sheila

March 2015 Week 5 - Part II

Hello Everyone,

I was able to finish the pull-outs on the diagonal fold book.

Pull outs inside diagonal pockets

Front of pull outs

Back of pull outs

Yay!

So, on to next month's book.  It will be a Layered Cut Paper Book.   This design lends itself to landscapes, but I would like to try something different and have the theme be "Geometric Area".   A better explanation of the theme would be a physical area defined by geometry, for instance, your living room simplified into shapes.

I will be providing more information about the size, type of paper, etc. in next week's post.

I did post some wonderful examples of Layered Cut Paper Books on my Pinterest Board for this blog.
Link:  EncasingStructure Pinterest Board

Until next week,

Happy Book Binding!
Sheila