one-of-a-kind

forget-me-not blooming in Winter, this makes me so very happy; as they're blue & small they are one of my all time favourites

snowdrops everywhere

in the background the 2 accordion books and a new one: a fabric booklet about a dead shrew, as drawn below

instructions for a Basic Instant Book, yes got that and tried a paper version before trying out the Cloth Instant Book, hurray
Or so I thought.....

the folding and ironing, not a problem, neither was the layout, but.....as I wanted to try out printing the photo's and text onto transfer paper which had to be ironed onto the linen, it all went pear-shaped.
What happened was while - carefully! - peeling the protective paper away text was removed as well and it was all rather wasteful, after two botched attempts with print transfers onto one instant book, I decided to use what pages I still could and make a different kind of book, which I'm not sure has a name.
In future I will have to rethink this working with cloth for a book, maybe even embroider the text, although I'm not sure I want to do that.

for the original tale, link here

The Dead Shrew

On the left a successful photo-transfer of the dead shrew onto thin white cotton, which was then hand stitched onto the gorgeous, golden linen book cover.

Yet again I lost a letter, the capital 'A' and just a little bit of the 'p' - phew, there was quite a lot of cursing and mumbling by this time, I'm not proud to admit - not wanting to waste yet another page I stitched an 'A' and the 'p' 

I can be very impatient and am very result-driven, so this transfer business with all it's pitfalls is a challenge, as they say in newspeak

below on the left you can see the threads

again, a successful transfer print of the ink drawing onto the same thin white cotton, which was sewn onto a green linen page; there's a pocket space above the shrew for a delicate find, a feather perhaps, dog hairs or sheep fleece, something soft

to add a little interest to all the bare pages, an old weave experiment from one of Jude's classes; I never was able to find a suitable use for it as I wanted to keep both sides visible; I think it very appropriate here as a kind of gateway between the world of the living and the dead

Another perfect transfer onto the same white, sewn onto the blue linen page

measures 11 x 14 cm, closed

to conclude: I like the look and feel of a cloth book, however it's highly unlikely I'll be producing these by the dozens in this fashion; I feel if I want to make books in cloth I'll have to come up with something else, maybe without words, just (transfer-print) images, or lino prints, or embroider the words, but again I'm not sure that's where I want to go??? Also the transfer is delicate and easily damaged, therefore not suitable for a child, hmmph a conundrum*

music from one of my favourite singers/musicians  Radie Peat, performing 'Dark Horse' 

*yes I did add that word just because I like it