Still playing with the long stitch book structure. This one is similar to the flapped closure I did in May, but with a ribbon tie instead of the button-and-string closure.

I can’t remember where I bought this ribbon, but I’ve wanted to do something like this with it for a while. It’s a matte cotton ribbon with a loose weave, so it has a bit of a rough texture to it.

I like the black cotton paired with the very smooth, blue-gray card stock. But I think I like the button tie closure more: maybe because the closure doesn’t extrude beyond the edges of the book on the button tie closure, or because the closure thread on that version echoes the thread used in the spine sewing.

I like simple things.

I was so happy with II that I decided to turn it into a set.

I uses the same handmade Lokta bark paper from Nepal as II. Aside from the reversal of colors, and the difference in the cut-out, it is constructed in the same way.

The sewing is, again, the Long Stitch Through Slotted Wrapper Cover, from Keith Smith’s Non-Adhesive Binding I: Books Without Paste or Glue. It’s a slightly wonky sewing, what with the offset and the leaning threads at the top and bottom, and often I like a little more symmetry but here I find its lack rather suits the handmade feel.

I have a number of colors of the Lokta paper. I think it would be neat to make a whole set of these, with a slip case to hold them all, so that the different colored spines would be showing with the stitching. Though I’m not sure I’m interested enough by the idea to venture into box making (I’ve made one box and it turned out okay, but it doesn’t excite me.)

I wanted a little extra gift to send to Jane when she and Patrick get home from their wedding (see the guest book post earlier this month). Since she liked the geranium paper, and her wedding shoes are green, I wanted to make note cards that matched the theme. But I can’t draw, I really can’t, so I traced one of the geraniums from the guest book paper and used that for the note card. I’m quite happy with the result, and the color is about perfect with the Moss envelopes from Paper Source.

Since Gocco is all about the multiples, I not only had enough cards for Jane, but for myself as well. And since I had a few challenges getting the full bleed to work (getting ink off the edges of the paper), I cut some of the splotchy ones up into gift tags.

I made a number of book blocks this weekend by sewing sections onto tapes, and I saved all the short bits of linen thread that are left at the end of the sewing to use as ties for the tags.

I’ve done a fair bit in the studio recently, but almost all of it is prep work for books yet to be finished: the boards are cut and the sections laid out, punched and/or sewn onto tapes, all in preparation for a bunch of books-to-be, but there is not much interesting to show you. I like to do this sometimes, get all the production work out of the way, or enjoy the meditative repetition of tearing down paper sheets or sewing sections onto linen tapes. But then sometimes I want something to be done.

The cover for II is handmade Lokta bark paper from Nepal, which I purchased from Hollander’s. It’s made from two pieces: the off-white piece is folded over the red one, so the cover is three layers thick and the cut-outs show the red underneath. The covers and pages are all secured in place by the sewing, so this is a true non-adhesive book.

The sewing is from Keith Smith’s Non-Adhesive Binding I: Books Without Paste or Glue.

l like the simplicity of this little book (only 4-1/2″ wide by 5-3/4″ high by 1/4″ thick). The texture of the paper makes it pleasurable to hold and, along with the contrast of the stitching and the strong graphic cut-outs, interesting to look at. The cover is delicate (this is not a book to be tossed in a bag) but still solid enough to provide structure. I often forget about these paper-covered books, but I come back to them again and again. I think there are 10 more of them in my near future.

I’m unabashedly pleased with myself on this guest book, which is a wedding gift for Jane and Patrick.

There are three sections of Rives BFK cover-weight paper totalling 24 sheets. The sections are attached to the spine using the Woven Chain sewing from the second volume of Keith Smith’s non-adhesive binding series, 1- 2- & 3-Section Sewings, and 12/3 waxed linen thread. There’s 1/4″ between the first and second sewing stations at the top, and 3/4″ between the remaining sewing stations. There are a couple of reasons why I like this sewing (in spite of the agony of punching all those holes): it’s attractive on the outside, and it has good structural integrity because thread runs all the way down inside each sections.

Finished size is 11-5/8″ wide by 7-3/4″ high by 1-3/8″ deep. Jane picked out the lovely geranium Japanese paper from The Paper Place. The book cloth is Asahi book cloth from Talas.