Vermont’s 20th Open Studio Weekend is just around the corner (May 26 & 27)! If you’re planning on visiting my studio (and you totally should), you can visit other great artists within a 20-ish minute drive of here.

There are 7 studios participating in the Montpelier/Calais area. Artists are offering exhibits and demonstrations of pottery, jewelry, photography, mixed media, painting, and more.

I’ll be referring to studios by both name and number – the number refers to a listing in the 2012 Vermont Studio Tour Guide. There are several ways to get your hands on a map:

• Pick up a copy at Artisans Hand Craft Gallery at the intersection of State and Main Streets in Montpelier (they’re an official Regional Information Center)
• Print out a full copy (warning – this is a big file)
• View a detailed map of Washington County on the Vermont Crafts Council website

Here’s the rundown of who’s who (click on the links to learn more about specific artists):

• #209 - Annie Tiberio Cameron Photography/Annie Tiberio Cameron: Photography, botanicals, abstracts, nature, wilderness. 
• #210 – Artisans Hand: Vermont State Craft Center. Contemporary Vermont crafts, jewelry, photography.
• #211 - Blue Roof Designs/Elissa Campbell: Handmade books (that’s me!)
• #213 – Thistle Hill Pottery/Jennifer Boyer: Functional stoneware pottery.
• #215 – Ray Brown: Memory-based landscapes painted in oils.
• #216 – Missy Storrow: Expressionist water media paintings, photography, oils.
• #217 – The Happiness Paradigm/Ginny Sassaman: Banners, mobiles, pins, cards, happiness.

Please note that (unfortunately) studios #212 and #214 have had to opt out of the tour.

I created the map below to help you plan your travels. Because the studios are so close to each other, you can visit quite a few of them within a short period of time.

Have fun!

Make that map bigger!

We were introduced to the various tools that we’d be using on our bone folders – it’s primarily hand work. She said that she’s often asked why she doesn’t teach the workshop using power tools and she had a wonderful response:

There’s nothing like lavishing a lot of attention on something by hand.

This was soon followed by:

My day hasn’t started unless I’ve cut myself.

That was part of the safety lecture. As one would expect, don’t aim sharp or bladey things at your body parts.

Shanna did a demonstration of how to use a rasp (in a non-raspy voice). She gave us this great tip – put a tennis ball on the handle of the rasp and then you can rest that end of it on your leg (the ball adds cushion). Secure the other end of the rasp and then you can just move the bone over it to remove material.

If this doesn’t make sense, just check out the photo below, which will hopefully clarify it for you.

You start with the coarser rasp and work your way down to the finer ones. If you need to remove a lot of material, use a hatchet. I was afraid to use a hatchet (mostly because I was tired), so I started with a thinner piece of bone.

We’re working with elk bone and got to choose the size and shape we wanted to use.

Here are the pieces I chose:

And here’s the piece I worked on today:

Now you get to watch it get smoother:

As you can see, I’m making my bone folder with two flat, spatula-esque edges – I like having tools I can get into tight spaces. I’m just now realizing that it kinda looks like an oar.

I have this strange urge to create a wavy midsection…or perhaps a spiral like this etching tool?

Betsy told us about her history in the book arts, which is extensive. Seriously extensive.

She explained that there are three issues in dealing with collections:

1. How do you attach material to the page?
2. How do you compensate for the addition of materials to an album?
3. How do you put the album together?

She then explained that there are three categories of binding albums:

1. Stab bindings
2. Sewn bindings (through a fold)
3. Adhesive (ex. perfect binding)

Something new I learned today – when gluing covers, the universal turn-in is 3/4″. I’m already doing that, so I’m psyched to know that it’s a standard.

More nuggets of knowledge from Betsy:

• Use a synthetic bristle brush with synthetic adhesives and a natural bristle brush with natural adhesives.
• PVA is for gluing exterior materials and paste is for gluing interior materials.
• Cloth shrinks when wet and expands when dry. Paper does the opposite – expands when wet, shrinks when dry.

When we glued the covers for what will become a book of samples of attachment methods, I was so stressed out. I couldn’t focus and made so many mistakes. I had to go back to the studio after dinner to redo one of the covers.

Not that I’ve ever made photo albums before. Ugh.

And now for some coolness, meet the Veritas Precision Square:

It’s a little peanut of a tool, but a bit pricey at $24.50 plus shipping. I’d have to think more about getting one.

Betsy recommended Conservation of Scrapbooks and Albums – Postprints of the Book and Paper Group/Photographic Materials Joint Session at the 27th AIC Annual Meeting as a source for more information on album structures. You can get it from the AIC website for $30.00 – so getting it.

And for the last bit of coolness, we were introduced to the Shoemaker’s knot. I had never heard of it before. It’s like a regular knot, but you bring the loop through the opening twice (this isn’t a double knot). It can be untied like a regular knot, but it doesn’t come undone by itself. Brilliant!

Yesterday I took a stroll down to Postcard Town. Ugh.

Ugh aside, I love love love my postcard this year and it is big – 8.5″ x 6″. Check it out:

Once again, I received help from my hubby on the design. Did I mention that I love them? Here’s the back for you curious folk:

Once again, I used a QR code in the bottom right-hand corner of the postcard. If you’re on my mailing list, you’ll just have to scan that dealie with your smart phone to find out what it says.

Here’s a closeup of the QR code:

It’s got my logo in it! I used Unitag’s Custom QR Code Generator. Not only can you add your logo to a code, but you can also change the color.

The mailing will be going out tomorrow. It includes a coupon that you can use when visiting me during Open Studio Weekend.

If you’d like to join my snail mail list, just contact me and I’ll hook you up. I have three postcards with me at PBI, so you’ll get one postmarked from Michigan!

My book Little Known Facts About Crap is in the exhibit. If you didn’t get to see it at the S.P.A.C.E Gallery, you have a second chance!

You can view images from the exhibit on the Guild website. Be sure to check out our review in Seven Days, where the author granted my book a “Funny Award”.

If you’d like to check out the show, here’s the scoop:

Creative Space Gallery
235 Main Street
Vergennes, VT 05491
(802) 877-3850

Dates: May 3, 2012 – June 24, 2012
Gallery Hours: Thursday – Friday 1:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m., Saturday: 10:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., Sunday 10:30 a.m. – 2:00 p.m.

The covers are now safely tucked away in the press.

I spent a chunk of the afternoon packing a box to send ahead to PBI (Paper and Book Intensive) – I fly out on Sunday!

My next project was to make a sample for my upcoming Travel Companion Journal workshop at Studio Place Arts. I started by carving the word “Go” into the cover.

The journal includes pockets both inside the covers and in the text block. I had to figure out the dimensions for the end page pockets and create a template.

I crumpled up brown Lokta paper to create a leather-ish texture. After flattening out the paper, I glued it to the covers. Then I glued in the end page pockets.

Lastly, I cut letters out of a map and glued them into the recessed areas on the cover.

Tomorrow I’ll work more on the surface design and create the text block.

On Sunday morning, I’ll be flying out to Michigan for the Paper and Book Intensive. I’m actually going.

I had convinced myself that I was never going to go. I applied two years ago and wasn’t accepted – that’s the kind of thing that sets the Brain of Doom in motion. The Brain of Doom sucks.

But I’m actually going. To Ox-Bow.

I’m attending the following workshops:

Album Alter­na­tives with Betsy Palmer Eldridge:

The recent pop­u­lar­ity of albums has led to an increased inter­est in the vari­ety of album struc­tures avail­able and in the dif­fer­ent ways mate­ri­als can be attached to the album leaves. This ses­sion will intro­duce and show exam­ples of many of the his­tor­i­cal meth­ods. In addi­tion, it will show two lesser-known but use­ful meth­ods. The first is how to include folio mate­r­ial with­out a thread inter­rup­tion in the gut­ter mar­gin: the sec­ond is how to bind stiff leaf mate­r­ial using the 1865 Philadel­phia Patented method. The advan­tages and dis­ad­van­tages of each will be dis­cussed. Par­tic­i­pants will make take-home mod­els of as many of these meth­ods as the time allows and their inter­est dictates.

I received an Email from Betsy a week ago that said “Just found your name on my PBI participants list and look forward to having you in my class.” [insert Elissa's faint here] Yes. I’m a geek.

Cus­tom Bone and Steel Tools for Book Working with Shanna Leino:

Dur­ing this class you will be work­ing with two very handy and ver­sa­tile mate­ri­als: elk bone and steel. First, stu­dents will be intro­duced to the tools and tech­niques needed to form and fin­ish bone fold­ers of ones own design. Smooth, pol­ished to a shine, and fit­ting per­fectly in your hand—there is noth­ing like the feel of a bone folder you’ve made your­self. You will then cross over to steel, learn to make a chas­ing tool and a stamp for mak­ing an impres­sion into most met­als and use­ful for adding orna­men­ta­tion on your book cov­ers. Sim­ple meth­ods of adding adorn­ment to your tools will be demon­strated. No pre­vi­ous expe­ri­ence is nec­es­sary, how­ever this class is demand­ing on the hands and arms. Expect to leave with two or three bone fold­ers and one chas­ing tool that will be beau­ti­ful to look at and won­der­ful to use!

I’m psyched to meet Shanna for many reasons, one of them being that she’s from New Hampshire. It’s great to have such a wonderful resource close to home and I plan to talk to her about doing a workshop for the Book Arts Guild of Vermont.

Using a Cat­a­lyst for Artist Book Creation with John Car­rera:

The Pic­to­r­ial Webster’s was always intended to be used as a cat­a­lyst for cre­ative writ­ing. Stu­dents’ main instruc­tional assign­ment will be to write a story based on one page of images. Using Pic­to­r­ial Webster’s as a source for cre­ative input in a class will be excit­ing, as what one makes from the book is never about the book, but what is inside each per­son. Because each stu­dent is using a com­mon ref­er­ence, under­stand­ing what has tran­spired within the cre­ative engine of each student’s mind can be more read­ily under­stood and dis­cussed. The goal will be to find new meth­ods for inspir­ing the cre­ative process. An intense four days will begin with cre­at­ing three books in an hour. You will then be given three dif­fer­ent meth­ods for using Pic­to­r­ial Webster’s as a source for your own new artist book. Each par­tic­i­pant will cre­ate at least one work­able dummy for a future edi­tion of your own or a fin­ished one-of-a-kind. Stu­dents will make use of addi­tional sec­tions from the off­set ver­sion of the book.

John’s Pic­to­r­ial Webster’s was the set book for the New England Chapter of the Guild of Book Workers‘ juried exhibition deFINEd BINDINGS: 26 Bindings of the Pictorial Webster’s Dictionary. So cool.

There’s internet access at Ox-Bow, but I don’t know how accessible the access is. I hope to blog at the end of each day so you can see what I’m up to at PBI. One way or another (if not daily), I’ll blog about the workshops.

Stay tuned!

The custom photo album tweaks the page paper of the Sea Green Floral photo album. Instead of white paper with flecks, this album includes a smooth dark green paper. I tend towards neutral colors for photo album pages, so this combination is one that I most likely would not have come up with on my own.

I love this combination!

The color of the paper is so rich. I’m sorry I couldn’t get a better picture of it.

I can’t wait to see how it looks when it’s done!

Earlier this month, I talked about the Bookbinding/Librarian merit badge from Ireland. I contacted the Ireland National Office for more information on what one has to do to earn the badge.

I quickly heard back from Conor McKeon, Programme Commissioner (Scouts) from Scouting Ireland.

He was kind enough to send me a scan of a page from the scout badge book – it includes the requirements for earning the badge:

1. Make two covers for holding loose sheets, covered in suitable material with punch holes for tread or ribbon.
2. Discuss this subject with your Patrol and instruct another Scout in Bookbinding.
3. Bind the Troop or Patrol Log Book.
4. Describe in simple terms, how a book is made.

Sadly, it looks like there won’t be a bookbinding-specific badge for much longer.

Here’s what Conor had to say:

The badge in question is from our old youth programme for Scouts.

For the last three years we have being transitioning to a new programme. As part of this programme scouts can design their own merit badges and they must fall under the following categories (Skill, Physical, Adventure, Community or Environment).

This essentially means if they want to bookbind they define the skill level they wish to achieve and it must be challenging to them.

If you like the badge and want one for yourself, you should probably get one now.

Not for actual dogs, but for their owners. Dogs don’t take pictures – that’s just silly.

And yes, I’m well aware that I’m working on this project now because I have my own dog. My own super-awesome, rocking Wiggum.

The plan was to make use of my time in the letterpress studio at Dartmouth. The concept was to use a variety of wood type to spell out assorted dog-ish words, all crammed together. Then I’d print it without ink (blind letterpress), imprinting the words into handmade paper. The paper would be used to cover photo albums.

Still with me? Great.

So last week, I spent 1.5 hours setting type – the word of the day was “arf”.

Sadly, the blind letterpress didn’t work, so I had to go for ink.

And then…and then…fail.

For whatever reason, the type couldn’t get through the press. One of the typefaces was too high.

And then I got to clean up.

And put all the type away, which I actually enjoyed.

Even though I don’t have anything tangible to show for my work, it was totally worth it. I love the process – setting type is rather meditative.

I haven’t scrapped the dog album idea – I’m still using letterpress, but I’m going for something less complex. Stay tuned!