Altered Book
I am breaking the rules again for the last book. Today's book is not a binding exactly, this is an altered book, called Blood, Sweat, & Tears: 365 Bindings. I cut the basic shape of the textblock (well, my Dad and his jigsaw cut it) and then I made three sealed compartments in the textblock where those blood, sweat, and tears are now saved. It was hard to save those things literally; so, I used bookbinding materials to represent them. The blood is a collection of little red leather circles. The sweat is curls of blotter paper. The tears are thin strips of silver stamping foil.
So that's it. The end of my 365 bindings project, which is now called the 365 Bindings in 455 Days project!
Happy Halloween everyone! Firstly, congratulations to Re:Paper, and the Sugar Skull book who won the BEST Zombie Award! The voting was a real nail biter. The Sugar Skull and my coffin book were neck in neck, always at each others heels, breathing down each others necks! Phew!
During the last few days, I've come upon some other books and book-related items that seem appropriate for Halloween. One of my favorite books, read and re-read, love it completely is Shelley's Frankenstein. Etsy seller, Lightreading, made this Mary Shelley art paper doll. Stained and shredded pages from Frankenstein are used to make the skirt, and lots of other materials and textures and images are used to complete her.
Also by Lightreading, this is a Halloween room decoration. Described in her Flickr photostream as "paper shreds strung with wire & black feathers and charms." The text is from three books, all in my list of favorites: Dracula, Sleepy Hollow and again Frankenstein.
This one seems to be the opposite of my own halloween book, which was the coffin with a book inside. This is a book with a skeleton inside. By Etsy seller,SauvageRavenCreation. This is "Tina, the twisted" - a small wooden book box transformed into Tina's final resting place.
I thought this was a terrific Halloween image, very goulish and spooky and such. And also great that it has a spooky book in it. I found this photo on Flickr - the description made me laugh, as it says the old book was "borrowed" (with the quotation marks) from a rare book library for the photo shoot. Hmmm...! This photographer also has a nice photo of Bram Stoker's gravestone and the absolute best Alien costume ever.
More room decorations for Halloween - book pumpkins! Looks like the books have been trimmed and opened 360 degrees, then little jack-o-lantern faces attached. I found this image on Flickr and also in context on the same person's blog, RoseyLittleThings, who has done a lot of Halloween decorating if you're looking for ideas.