Marbled book pages, for a change of pace

At one time, I could not intentionally disassemble or destroy a book of any kind; however, I have gradually come to the conclusion that not all books need to be saved for eternity. So, now I do not mind re-purposing some of those books because the materials can certainly be used for other interesting things.

Book #339

Tied Tapes

Today's binding is a standard 'sewn on tapes' variety, but then bound to the case by tying the sewing supports through the spine piece. This particular example has recycled leather on the cover and matching leather sewing supports. There are a lot of examples and variations of this technique in Laplantz' book, "Cover to Cover".

Book #116

Green Binding No.6

Another recycled book today. The cover is made using a plastic shopping bag that is folded to size, several layers thick, and then ironed into a solid, firm piece of plastic. The pages on this book are cut from used envelopes. I have used another of Smith's 3-section sewings for the binding, this one is called twisted Xs.

Book #115

Green Binding No. 5

Yet another book made from repurposed materials. I used a zipper coffee bag for the cover and the pages are cut from brown paper bags. I made a closure using an old button. For this book, I did use new linen thread... otherwise everything else was repurposed.

Thanks to Carley who told me about books she had made using these kinds of plastic zipper bags. I used a different binding than hers. For mine, I used one of Keith Smith's 3-section stitches called haxagonals. I really like how the cover has a pocket built in, since the zipper closure is still intact on the front so it could be used to hold a pencil or other small items.

Book #114

Green Binding No. 4

This book is made using the Secret Scottish Rubbish binding, which I have written about before if you want to read more about it. Again, all the materials are repurposed: cookie package for the cover, old envelopes for the pages, and the binding is "sewn" with a strip of plastic cut from a shopping bag.

Book #113

Green Binding No. 3

Another book made from repurposed materials today. The cover is cut from a cracker box, the pages are salvaged from the blue bin, and the binding is made from a twig and an elastic. I discovered this little structure over at Susan Kapuscinski Gaylord's site, www.makingbooks.com, when I was looking for ideas that I could make with kids. She has lots of great ideas on her website.

Book #112

Green Binding No. 2

It is Earth Day today! Do something good for the planet.

Today's book is another one made entirely from repurposed materials. Some time ago, I had to shred some documents that had been bound with these plastic coils. So I saved the plastic coils to see if I could use them again. Cut down to this smaller size, they work perfectly fine for a small notebook. The cover is made from a coffee cup that I flattened and trimmed. The pages are cut from paper salvaged from the blue bin. All materials repurposed and transformed into a handy little notebook. Reduce, reuse, recycle.

Book #111

Green Binding No.1

Tomorrow is Earth Day, so over the next few days I will show a few of the simple bindings that I have used for making "green" books. The first is one that I did with a group a teenagers and all the materials we used were repurposed. The covers were cut from various food boxes and the pages were from a printer/photocopier blue bin where all the sheets were blank on one side. The only other thing we needed was something to stitch the pages, and we cut a plastic bag into strips and used the long strips of plastic to sew the book.

Making Journals with repurposed materials

A while ago, I conducted a workshop at Inkwell, where we made journals entirely from recycled materials. Let me introduce, the Secret Scottish Rubbish Binding. I learned this book structure from Emma Fraser, a conservator and bookbinder, in Scotland. She invented this neat little book structure and always made it with box board for the covers, discarded papers and envelopes for the pages, and it is actually bound together with a plastic bag, all rubbish, hence its name.

Here's an example of a Secret Scottish Rubbish Binding, that I had brought to show the participants before we started.

Participants were asked to bring their own box board to the class, so there was a good variety of cover materials: cereal boxes, tissue boxes, shipping boxes, etc. We used a variety of discarded papers for the pages, and colourful plastic bags for sewing. Here I am, demonstrating the "sewing" process using a plastic bag.

Here is some of the work in progress. There does seem to be a lot of rubbish scattered around on the tables!

Finished books, and a shot of some spines so you can see how the plastic bag looks.

I also took this little sample with me. This is the same book structure, but it's made from new materials, no rubbish included. I wanted to show the workshop participants that they could use the technique this way as well and it looks pretty, but I honestly like the rubbish books better.

EDIT: June 12, 2022
When I originally posted this, I included a link to some instructions but that link stopped working years ago. Finally, I have a new link for you. Emma has posted a video of herself making a book using this technique, and you can watch her do it here:
https://youtu.be/huB5tyReqAw.

Have fun with it!

Nursery Rhyme Books

I picked up an old book of nursery rhymes at a thrift store, a while ago, and the book was falling apart. It was quite a large hardcover book, but the hinges were broken and some of the pages were falling out. I got it because it was full of great pictures. I used several pages out of this book previously, but it is a big book! So I made more last week. So these are my newest recycled and repurposed notebooks, and each is entirely one-of-a-kind. The cover pictures, obviously, are repurposed from the old story book. The papers used for the pages in these notebooks, are off-cuts from other projects that I have saved. That's why they are all different, odd sizes and shapes. I was also able to salvage all the book board from my scrap box. They are all bound using a chain stitch sewing.

A quick follow-up

Last week I showed you what was on the work bench... the junk mail, remember? Voila, very cool journals. The covers are, obviously, covered with junk mail and other previously-used envelopes. The pages are mostly blank paper (recycled paper, of course), with a few previously used business envelopes mixed in to keep it internesting. Each one also has an unused reply enveloped in the middle of the last section - those envelopes that come inside other envelopes so that we can easily mail our donations, or subscriptions, or whatever. So inside these books, those envelopes function as a handy little pocket to store secret things!

Main decorative element: security pattern from inside the envelopes...


This one is a total sweepstakes, someone with your initials is definitely a winner! Do not disregard...


And classic brown paper packages...

On the work bench today

Speaking of recycling...


It's not just a pile of junk mail. Well, it IS a pile of junk mail; but, it will be transformed... stay tuned.

flickr friday - RECYCLED

Another tag that I have used a lot on Flickr is RECYCLED. I've made books from a wide variety of recycled/repurposed materials, and it looks like there are over 120 photos tagged as such. Follow the RECYCLED link to see them all. Or, here are a few of them, randomly selected using the Flickr badge tool:

Green

Each year there is an exhibit of artists' books at Cuesta College in San Luis Obispo, California. This year's exhibit, "Artist's Books 2011," is happening now, continuing until August 26th. Included in this exhibit is a little green book that I made. It is a small book, an edition of 7, bound using a dowel-spine structure with all materials being recycled, reclaimed, repurposed, etc. The content is also green.


This little book recognizes the achievement of Canada's Green Party, successfully electing Elizabeth May, the first Green member of parliament, earlier this year. The pocket on the inside of the front cover includes a business card (from my local Green Party candidate, Thomas Trappenberg) that lists the principles of the Green Party. The remaining content recognizes the Green Party's acheivements and also questions why green principles are not already part of other political agendas.

Happy Earth Day

So I've really blown my New Year's Resolution this month but let me get back on track today, celebrating Earth Day, with some journals I made using all recycled and repurposed materials. These are hardcovers, each with an exposed spine and chain stitch binding.


The paper for the pages in these journals is 100% recycled. The board used for the covers is all scrap board that would have been destined for land fill: chip board, eska board, and some pressed cardboard from the back of a large sketchbook. The decorative papers on the covers are pictures torn from magazines. Each cover image is created by combining two different pictures that were torn into strips. Click the photo to make it bigger if you want a better look at the images.

Brown paper bags

We use way too much of everything and throw away most of it. So I try to find a use for some of that stuff that normally gets tossed aside. One of the things I have been saving is paper bags.


I also save the board from the back of sketchbooks, so I combined that with the paper bags and made some little notebooks with a chain stitch binding.


They are a million miles from archival, I know that; but, they are just notebooks for scribbling grocery lists or other simple things and I don't think they need to outlive me!

Here's a shot of the spines - as requested!

More Patchwork Journals

I had so much fun making the last batch of patchwork leather journals, that I made another batch. These are now available in my Etsy shop, of course. Each of the wrap-around covers are assembled from my heap of leather scraps, adhered to a larger piece of leather, then stitched to keep the pieces secure. Reclaimed buttons and braided cord closures finish the covers. These ones have all blank unlined, new, recycled paper for the pages (rather than pre-used blue-box papers like the last bunch). The binding is a longstitch and chain stitch combination, sewn directly through the covers.

More books from boxes

I just have to show some books I recently made by request using fun boxes. Because, not only is it fun to have all the products that are advertised on television, it is even more fun to have notebooks made from the boxes.

The Graty and SlapChop combo, of course.



The Snuggie, and yes, the Snuggie for dogs.

Celebrating Earth Day (wtih free stuff)!

April 22nd is Earth Day! In recognition of Earth Day, I am giving away free eco-friendly journals with any order from my Etsy or Artfire shops for the rest of this week (so, until midnight on Friday, April 23rd). Eco-friendly journals are ones that I have made entirely with materials that would have been otherwise destined for landfill. There are actually two ways you could win something from me: 1. Any purchase from MyHandboundBooks will receive a free eco-book automatically! 2. Leave a comment here telling me what you are doing to celebrate Earth Day. I'll randomly select one person's comment to win an eco-notebook too! (Make sure you leave your email address or link to contact information so that I can contact you if you win!) Edit April 24: This giveaway is closed. The winner! Congratulations to Pegg, the winner of my Earth Day giveaway! I had 15 comments to pick from, and I used random.org to generate a random number and it picked 10, and Pegg was lucky commenter number 10! Thank you to everyone who left comments here telling me about Earth Day activities, and thanks to those who made purchases this week; they got free eco-books too.

Repurposing materials for patchwork journals

I have finished another batch of journals made from repurposed and reclaimed materials. This time, the materials are the scraps and discards that I create when I make books. The catalyst for this project being the mountain of scrap leather on my floor last week.


So, the covers of these journals are made with small scraps of leather that have been matched and colour coordinated, adhered to a larger piece of leather, trimmed to fit a prepared textblock, then stitched.



The paper used for the pages has all come from the paper recycling bin beside my work table. That includes whatever I found in there, like papers from the computer printer, envelopes, sketchbook covers, paper leftover from other projects, etc. The result is an interesting mix of papers in each book, suitable for art journals or any writer who likes to get creative while journaling. Closures on these journals are made from either strips of leather found in the scrap pile and/or reclaimed buttons. I made eight of these books last week, and sadly, there has been no discernible difference in the size of Leatherscrap Mountain.