it just occurred to me that i hardly ever show photos of books and journals that i make. that is actually really stupid... especially when i consider that i had a great opportunity of "advertising" my work because i had a little stall at a local arts and crafts fair on april 1st.
though i don't know how many people of my closer accquaintance who could have come to take a closer look actually read this...
anyway, i thought it was time to give you a closer look of what i do when i'm not knitting:
this was my display for the market that saturday (i was only there on saturday which was a pity on the one hand - the show went on for the whole weekend - but on the other hand: i already had a sore throat and there were so many interested people, i talked so much i literally lost my voice...)
i got the place at the fair on rather short notice - i had only three weeks to prepare, so i started a work frenzy and re-worked a lot of older stuff i had sitting in boxes (a bit of spicing up is always good) and finished some works in progress that i had gotten stuck with. sometimes i work better when i'm under a little bit of stress because it keeps me from thinking too much. when i think too much i tend to get stuck over little things, but when i have to get it done because there is a deadline i just go with what i feel and it often turns out better anyway... (of course that does not apply to everything and i really should not rely on it. getting your stuff together in time has its charms...)
i had several different things on offer, from cards to pocket size note- and sketchbooks to bigger junk journals. with some of them i had a little bit of a hard time putting them out on the table and there was one journal in particular that i let go with an inward sigh:
the lady who bought it came to look at it and went away again three times until she finally decided on buying it, and she said she didn't even know exactly what to do with it yet. i hope she does use it for something though. it would be a pity to have it collect dust in a corner...
this is a single-signature envelope journal and i used a bubble wrap envelope which made it interestingly puffy.
i used gift wrapping paper, magazine and junk mail cut-outs, envelopes with windows from bills, paper with some texture on that i had used to clean my stamps on and mop up overspray from inking with.
i added playing cards from incomplete games, postcards from far off places i had been given, a few die cuts and lots of tags and journaling cards.
i'd love to show you every page spread but that would just be too much... i included paperclips decorated with ribbons and flowers and tiny little envelopes with even tinier letters in them.
i really love the colours and how it turned out in general and as mentioned above i had a hard time letting it go... but it's worth it of course if it makes someone else happy.
this is another puffy envelope journal and it's a little bigger than the other one.
it features tea-dyed papers, doilies and envelopes, vintage sheet music and book pages, old calendar pages, some gift wrapping paper and textured vellum or glacine (i'm not sure what it is exactly, i found it in my mum's old stash of wrapping papers).
i ran some of the pages, pockets, envelopes and tags through my sewing machine with some colour changing thread and i used some post cards and cut-outs from calendars as tags and journaling cards.
in the middle of the signature there is an envelope that holds an old gift card wrapped in washi tapes that go with the general colour theme as well as some punched out file tabs in various styles and sizes for the owner to use.
then i had these little sketch books. they are only 4 3/4" x 7 1/4" - 12cm x 18,5cm. the covers came from old nature guides, classics of german literature and collections of well-known art prints by various well-known artists. according to my husband these would have been in every household in the early 20th century; they were printed in huge quantities (and are not worth more than a few euros each - just in case you were wondering).
(there was a man at the show who tried to convince me that i had destroyed priceless antiques. he wasn't the kind of person i felt i could have a rational conversation with and therefore i didn't argue with him. be assured though that i would never destroy a valuable book! when i get my hands on an old book with a beautiful cover we check various sources to make sure it is not a valuable antique.)
i reinforced the spines with fabric from my stash and stitched in new signatures made of artist drawing paper.
i call these little ones "back pocket journals" or, more elegantly, "coat pocket journals". they are small enough to fit in your pants' back pocket (or a coat pocket). the cover is just a post card, folded in half. my husband inspired me to make these. he has a really small booklet that he carries everywhere to take quick notes and uses it a lot.
each of them got their own little clip to hold them closed in the pocket or to tuck in little things you want to keep safe.
these little ones measure roughly 4 1/2" x 6 1/4" - 12cm x 16cm. (they actually were the main reason the guy i mentioned above was offended. he noticed the script on the cover and was convinced that these must have been made by the "Wiener Werkstätte" ("Vienna's Workshops") and therefore would have been very valuable. the truth is that this script got very popular and was copied by numerous companies because it instantly promised high quality and standard. it was used well into the 1930s and these books were available like sand at the beach...)
i made one in shades of mostly blue and green
and one with oranges and yellows.
i've used lots of different papers such as gift wrapping paper, normal printing and graph paper, pattern paper and even wax paper, vellum and glacine and wall paper.
these are very simple, without any pockets or tuck spots, just for writing and sketching. each one has an envelope covering the back cover to keep little bits and bobs in.
these used to be trashy novels from the 1960s or so. i really like using linen covered books to make journals out of. i pick them up at flea markets or the "open book shelf". the "open book shelf" is a little side room full of shelves in a public building in my town where you can drop off any books you no longer want to keep. books are way too precious to be thrown in the bin just because you don't want to read them any more. someone else might still want to. as well as bringing books you are free to take whichever one(s) you like. you could read and keep them, you could read and then return them or you could take them and make something new and pretty and usable out of them... that's what i do. whenever i happen to be there (our pediatrician is in that building) i rummage through the shelves and take a few that have nice linen bindings in pretty colours. and most of them really are just trashy old novels or outdated pieces of science... so no harm done to anyone and anything...
as you can see, i have quite a collection...
this is the one with all the fluffy stuff on the spine:
it is very wild and colourful and i used lots of left overs and "junk". the one with the buttons on the spine is filled entirely with design paper from a paper pad i couldn't stand. (i only had it because a lady who once ordered a custom album chose it and didn't want to keep the left overs herself - i made the journal to use up as much of these papers as possible. don't get me wrong: it is pretty, just not the colours and patterns i would naturally pick out myself.)
the one with the pretty stitching on the spine is filled with vibrantly coloured pattern paper and spray-inked paper, envelopes, paper bags and doilies.
i included file tabs, ticket strips, mini envelopes and scraps from the design paper to put in the envelopes and paper bags.
i tea dyed everything that was white and i love the marks that paper doilies leave on the paper when you overlap them while drying.
i had several of these slider cards in various styles and colours still left from a while ago.
the shaped side panels slide out to the sides and reveal space to write a message. they fit in a standard business envelope and people apparently really liked them. one couple bought 5 of them and asked if i had even more different colours in stock...
these bowls and trays are filled with ticket strips, mini envelopes and file tabs. i punched and die cut them from the many many scraps i've collected so that customers who'd buy a journal could rummage through them and pick some to go with their new book... they didn't get it even though i explained it again and again... one lady bought a mini envelope and told me she'd mail it to a friend who makes little mice out of felt, dresses them and provides them with to-size props. she said the little envelope would be just the right size for one of these mice... i thought that was really cute.
then there were my scrolls:
these are cardboard tubes (like eco-friendly lip balm tubes) that i decorated and filled with a tightly wound roll of cash register paper which happened to be the perfect height for the tubes i had.
the paper is attached to a wooden skewer. you can pull out any length of paper you want and then wheel it back in by turning the bead at the bottom in the right direction. i have to admit: i'm really pleased with (i tried that out on a whim) and quite fond of them (i like odd formats of paper).
in the back corner i had some ring binders. they are A5 (a european standard size which is half the size of a standard sheet of printer paper) and maybe that's the reason i still have them. some people were interested in them and one lady actually said to me that these would be lovely to use for her singing group - if they were bigger... sheet music usually comes in A4 (standard sheet of printer paper). i don't know what i thought when i made these. maybe it was mostly that i thought i couldn't make them any bigger because that would have meant quite a lot of material issues... maybe they'd make nice folders for single-sheet art journaling though...
to the right of the ring binders i had a few leporello books. three rather artsy ones with lots of shaped papers and vellum pages and special features and two really boring ones with just writing paper - the orange and the green one - and funnily enough: it were the boring ones i sold. sometimes i think other people just don't get "it"... (although i have to be honest and say that i don't get a lot of "it" either some times so i can't really expect better of others i guess.)
the other type of cards i had are these fun button cards.
the round table with the spiral can turn (indicated by the arrow) and you're supposed to write your message on this spiral. the recipient of the card has to turn it round and round to read the message. i guess i could have used flat brads for hold the spiral in place but then i made these i either didn't think of that or i didn't have any that were flat enough. so i decided to use buttons, cut a hole in the card front (because of the dimension of the buttons) and use them as a design feature.
what naturally has buttons on it? well, pieces of clothing, that's what... i hand sketched all of the different styles i came up with. the top center one is a shoe, just in case you were wondering, because most people looking at them seemed to be wondering. i don't know why because it very much looks like a shoe to me... i included the panties and the bra more as a joke (they didn't really go well) but the sleeve and the two shirt fronts were rather popular. i will turn what's left of them into christmas cards. (and hopefully remember to show you.)
well, that's about it i think... at least with the stuff i had at the little craft fair. it was a nice experience. i didn't sell a lot but i didn't expect much to be honest and for that i think i did really well. i explained a lot and many people were very interested in how i work and why i like doing what i do. it was really nice. what i wanted most of all was to get a feel for the audience, if you know what i mean. i wanted to see how ordinary people who just browse through the various arts and crafts on a weekend reacted to my style and the kind of creativity that's involved in making and keeping a journal of that kind. that's why it was important to me to have as many different ones on offer as i could manage to make/finish on short notice. some of the other exhibitors were rather astonished that i asked comparatively little for my books and cards. i know that i could and probably should have asked more but i really wanted to see how people reacted to them first. it's really a difficult decision to make: do i want to sell things, knowing that i probably get less for them than they are worth, or do i want to push for a fair price, knowing that i might not sell anything at all because people think it's too expensive and they don't want to spend their money on something they don't even know how to use or what it's for? i found that people are more likely to buy pretty things if they are just affordable, even if they don't really need them, rather than buy something they really want if it's too pricey. and sadly lots of "ordinary" people (as in: non-crafty people) often don't really understand the time and effort that goes into a handmade item, whatever craft it might be, and they are often quick to judge it as too expensive or at least unreasonably priced... whatever it may be, i think it's a lesson that everyone who sells at craft shows needs to learn for themselves and find their own balance between their desire to make a profit (nothing wrong with that) and their desire to sell lots of stuff (nothing wrong with that either). both at the same time would be best of course - haha!
lots of love to you all! xxx
