Binding a book with my painted papers

A few weeks ago I found myself being fascinated by a stack of beautiful papers that someone, somewhere here on the internet (don't remember where) shared. I was able to trace the origin of the technique, by which they were made, back to the artist LK Ludwig. Soon I was enrolled in her online class Backlog.

I'm rather late on the ball because the class was introduced in 2010. But I must say it was well worth the money, it is full of information, videos and inspiration.

Take a look at what I have done:

Black and light blue and reductive stamping

Tiger pattern stencil

I used some old sheets of sketching paper and some of the acrylic paint I have lying around.

Stack of painted papers

I folded each sheet in half and used two papers to make one signature. In total I made six signatures which makes 24 pages.

The class teaches a way to bind them toghether using ribbons, and here's how mine ended up.

Stiching the book

I made the covers out of chipboard which was painted the same way as the pages.

With cover

Here is a peek in the book.

Some of the pages

I will use the book for art journaling with my own photos. I have begun to add pictures to it and I also made a page.

Before journaling

And after adding hand writing.

After journaling

In my head

Sometimes my head is so filled with thought swirling around that it is hard to sort things out. So I decided to try and put it down on paper. This is what was in my head a few weeks ago.

Full of it!

The hammer and screwdriver symbolizes the terrible headace I had at the time.

Themed walk Berlin

We spent a few days in Berlin over our childrens autumn holliday. I captured some of the cool graffiti I found in Berlin.

This is a huge artwork that covers the entire gable of a house nearby the Technology Museum.

It wasn't really a focused themed walk like this one I did a few weeks at home, because I wasn't focusing only on the graffiti as we were walking. I just captured the ones that really caught my eyes.

I found this boxer under a railway bridge.

If you want to focus on graffiti as a theme in a city like Berlin you have a wealth to dig from. It is everywhere. But there is so much else to see for a person who visits for the first time.

Chess lover.

Bold colors.

And of course I couldn't resist photographing this one!

More love!

iHanna features a photo theme each month


and November months theme is Street Art, how suitable. Head over there for more graffiti inspiration!

If you would like to see some of the sketches I made during our trip go here.

Expectation vs. reality - the truth about sketching and traveling in Berlin

Last week my kids had their autumnholiday so we went on a trip to...

Of course I had planned to sketch on the trip. I packed a journal and some pens, a fountain pen and a set of watercolors.

In my mind I had anticipated to fill up my almost new journal completely. I saw myself sketching at museums while my kids explored. Drawing street life and people at cafés and restaurants.

In reality I only did about a handfull of drawings. Beer glasses and soft drinks at restaurants.

A few boats at the huge Museum of Technology.

The hotell lobby.

And people in the tax free shop at the Tegel airport.

What went wrong?

One reason is that sketching actually is quite time consuming, at least for me. If I whip out my journal and a pen at a museum to start drawing something my family don't want to hang around and wait for me. Instead they they move on and I'm left behind. That is no fun. I too want to explore and see the exhibitions.

I found that situations when we were forced to wait was the most suitable to work in my journal. Like at restaurants, at the airport etc. The drawback is that you don't get to choose what to draw, but more or less have to settle for what is in front of you.

So much for the romantic idea of drawing beatiful sceneries and lively street life when travelling with small (-ish) kids.

Well, Berlin is great, for sure. It is huge. We walked and walked and still we only saw a small part of it. I need to go back to explore more.

I didn't realize this when booking the trip but now in November it is 25 years since the fall of the Berlin wall. We visited Bornholmer Strasse where there are still some remains of the wall. It was very interesting to see it in real life and to read about it's history.

Eventhough the wall was a reality when I grew up and after actually seen some of it now, it is still hard to grasp that one of the biggest cities in Europe was divided.

Where have all the flowers gone?

Where have all the colors gone?

It sure is autumn here. Only a few leaves are still clinging on to the branches and those that do are pale yellow or brown. There are no flowers to draw and summer seems far away.

I brought my tiny Moleskine journal and Lamy safari pen on my walk and decided to draw something. Birches and pine finally ended up in my sketchbook.

Autumn colors

The watercolor was added when I got home.

I copied the twig to the left in my (slightly) bigger sketchbook, and I turned out like this.

Bigger twigg

Today the rain is pouring down so no sketching outdoors can not be done. Maybe I will do something similar to these more imaginary trees that I did a few weeks ago.

Graphical tree

Or this more colorful, map like tree shape.

Quick sketches

Sketching people that walks, talks and makes all kinds of movements is a challenge. I went out to try and capture a few glimpses.

People waiting for the tram.

To the left: a view from above of an old house. To the right: a dady with a stroller and a shopping bag.

From a café; boys staring at their smartphones and a dad with kid hiding behind an adidas bag.

On my sewing table

Thanks to Creativebug.com, a huge source of creative inspiration to me, I have made myself busy sewing clothes. Back when I was a teenager I did some trousers and tunics and so, but for many years I never even thought of making my own clothes. I didn't think I could make them look professional enough to actually wear them in the end. 

But a couple of months ago I discovered Cal Patch's class Pattern drafting on Creative bug and I was hooked. Since then I have sewn t-shirts, leggings and soon skirts. This is on my sewing table right now and I will finish it this weekend, only the hem is left.

It is made of a dark blue fabric with an orange stripe in it. It is a really short mini-skirt. The pattern is from Jenny Hellström's book Sy! Urban Collection. It is a great book for beginners as well as more experienced seamstresses, I think. All pattern are rated based on its difficulty. This skirt is called Mary skirt and is actually a 5 out of 5 on the difficulty scale. But the instructions are easy to follow and I'm pleased with the result.  What is left to find out is whether or not I'm actually going to wear it. Mini skirts are not my everyday choice... One project is never enough though. In parallell I'm working on another skirt. It is a bigger project since it is completely handsewn. It is a technique developed by Nathalie Chanin and she demonstrates it in a class over at Creativebug - where else?

The skirt is made of four panels, like this one. It consists of two fabrics on top of each other. On the top layer a pattern is created and then the two layers are stiched together by tracing the pattern. Then you cut out holes in the top layer to reveal the bottom fabric. 

In the picture above you can see both the front and back of the panel. The knots are on the back side. In many of the designs that Alabama Chanin sell they put the knots on the front as a design element.

The pattern to this skirt is from one of the books that Natalie Chanin has written called Alabama Stich Book. It is great!

The book comes with a stencil of the pattern that I used in my skirt. I made a large stencil from the small one in the book, by tracing it to a big sheet of sturdy felt.

  

With this big stencil I transfered the pattern by applying black fabric paint with a sponge onto the top fabric. 

This project is a bit time consuming. Both making the stencil, transfering the pattern to the fabric and then all the handsewing takes time. But I think the result so far is promising. Hope the skirt fits in the end!