Sunny bird photo album to celebrate sunny September

This weekend was unusually warm and sunny after last week's cold spell. To celebrate this, I've been working on a bright yellow photo album that would be perfect for a wedding.

Today, I've been carving a linocut lovebird design to go on the front of the album. I thought I'd share some of the process with you to show the different stages involved in making one of my books, and also some of the difficulties encountered when printing!

Stage 1: Cut the pages, sew the book block and attach the end papers. I found a zingy yellow linen thread that will go beautifully with my covers, it's just a shame that most of the stitching will be hidden..

 Stage 2: After working out and cutting my linocut design, it's time to print it!

I take initial test prints on scrap paper:

I then re-cut the lino block with some final tweaks before printing onto the 'proper' final paper:

 

My designs are quite detailed and delicate, so they come out best when I apply lots of thin layers of ink to the block. But sometimes the print looks too pale if I've not rolled enough ink onto the block. You might like this effect, but I prefer a strong bold print.  Sometime, I will try to rectify this by re-printing the block, but as you can see above, you can end up with a double image which looks a bit blurred.

Printing a block well takes time to get enough ink on the block and the right pressure from your press. But with some perseverance, you finally get the elusive print you were looking for. Hooray!

Here's a shot of the final book, all glued together and ready to go between boards for a final press.

New logo!

As you can see, I've changed my logo to a much nicer magpie with a moon in the background. Thank you so much to Cristina at Sombras Blancas for designing such a beautiful and much improved logo and banner for me!

Papermaking

Yesterday, I went to a workshop at the lovely West Yorkshire Print Workshop to learn the art of Papermaking. It was really fun (and very stinky!) mushing up paper, getting very wet and making lots of lovely sheets of handmade paper.

It's really easy to make paper, you just tear up any old paper, add water, add some plant fibers and pulp it up with a kitchen blender. Next, take a large container such as a plastic box, fill with water and add the pulp and swirl.

Finally, get a mould and deckle, and scoop the pulp onto it to make beautiful sheets of paper.  The more pulp, the thicker the paper.

Here are some of my experimental sheets:

 

The whiter sheets were made by adding titanium oxide to the pulp. We also added Daphne to the pulp, a type of Nepalese plant paper. Can't wait to get tearing up and pulping more old paper now, what better way to recycle all that junk mail!