Homemade Sign

Last week a friend of mine came back home after about a month in Europe. Another friend and I were thrilled to pick him up at the airport and we decided it would be fun to make one of those cheesy welcome home signs you always see in the movies. 

It began with a sketch of what the sign should look like. This also helped me catch spelling and logistical mistakes before we went large-scale.

Then, to the big blank page...

The plan was to have a faux bunting feel so I made a template triangle then traced it to get all the other triangles. Since we were being cheesy, I wanted the sign to have a playful/childish look so the triangles were free-hand cut with an X-acto making each one a bit different.

We just used glue sticks and my trusty bone folder to attach everything.

The letters were all hand drawn and colored; again to keep a playful look.

The finished sign was a hit! Sadly, I do not have an image of Sergei actually happy to see it, but it helped him find us, I swear.

Shades of Green and Brown

View all the way to the East Bay

Growing up in Connecticut, I went on a lot of walks through the woods. With it's crisp fresh air and wide array of colors, no time was better for these walks than autumn. 

The Bay Area has had plenty of crisp, cool days lately so, on Sunday I gathered 2 of my favorite people and went for a hike. We headed off to Mt. Tamalpais. Everything was green and brown instead of the New England color palette but it was beautiful and fairytale-esque none-the-less. Here's a sampling of what we saw.

Kent Falls

Well, the studio in my new place (yes, I have a 'real' studio space) still isn't unpacked, and I still have a lot of East Coast photos to share so, here are some more. 
While away I took a day to go for a hike at Kent Falls, a place I frequented with friends while in high school. Now, I think the Pacific Northwest is one of the most beautiful places ever, and one of my favorites but, what always amazes me when I'm in New England, is how green everything is in the spring and summer. 

Intermediate Bookbinding: Week 9

This is a bitter sweet post because this past week was the ninth, and final, week of my Intermediate Bookbinding course. Sigh. After nine weeks you can't help but become friends with your classmates and instructor and, while one never needs an excuse to make a book, it's always nice to have a designated time to get your binding action on. 
Here's the wrap up of the final week:

Ready, set, go!

Checking to make sure my boards fit my book--they did.

I was temporarily single (just kidding Charlie). Because any metal can potentially damage the leather when you're working it, I had to remove my rings.

Before gluing, I had to mark where the boards would go on the leather and where the corners would be.

Then I literally cut corners...hahaha

After gluing the leather and boards together there was weighting, and waiting.

While we were waiting for the paste and leather to dry, we got a very basic blind tooling intro and a little practice in. It's fun but I definitely need more classes to perfect this skill.

Before tooling the real cover, I marked and trimmed the turn-ins.

Leather books are cased in using wheat paste, which isn't as tacky as other adhesives, like PVA, so we used Ace bandages to hold the covers tight over the book while the paste dried.

Voila! A finished book! And...

My Bookbinding certificate, I'm so proud of myself!