TACKET BINDING with Michele Kamprath

At April's Newport Paper and Book Arts Festival in Newport, Oregon, several NORBAG members took a Tacket Binding class from our member from Alaska, Margo Klass. Michele will teach a version of one of those bindings at the June workshop.

Michele's elegant example

Materials to bring:

• Cover paper: cardstock or Mi-Teintes 5 5/8" x 12" grain short
• Cover liner paper: light cardstock or text weight paper 5 1/2" x 8 5/8" grain short
• 2 signature wraps: light cardstock or text weight paper 5 1/2" x 8 5/8" grain short
• 12 pieces of text weight paper for the signatures: 6 pieces of text weight paper 8 1/2" x 11" cut in half to 5 1/2" x 8 1/2". When folded, signature size is 5 1/2" x 4 1/4"

(Paper note: if you need to buy paper and want to keep it to a minimum, you can buy two 12" sheets to use for both cover, signature wraps, and cover liner paper. Solid color paper on the spine of your book will show your stitching better than paper with a pattern. Contrasting colors for the cover and liner papers will make the book more interesting but one color will also work.)

Tools to bring:

• 2 large paper clips
• Waxed linen thread 4 ply in two colors or Perle cotton thread #5 in two colors
• Bees wax to wax un-waxed thread
• Needle: tapestry needles #20 or #22 or #2 crewel needles blunted with sandpaper
• Small needle nosed pliers if you have them may be useful
• Cutting mat
• Piercing tool
• Scissors
• Pencil
• Eraser
• Ruler
• Phone book or piercing cradle
• Glue stick
• Cover embellishments

To be provided:

• Instructions
• jig for signatures and cover
• Examples and discussion on tacket bindings

When:   Saturday, June 10 at 12 noon
Where:  Eureka Methodist Church at Del Norte & F Streets
RSVP:   Yes by June 5 to Michele. Contact information is in the newsletter
Cost:     50 cents
Bring:    See above list

Be sure to scroll down to see photos from the May shaving cream marbling workshop.

Shaving Cream Marbling Workshop by Lara Cox

In May, Lara Cox gave a workshop using shaving cream to marble paper. While this is not the traditional marbling we find in books, it is a fun surface design technique. And a bit messy.

Lara Cox demonstrates how to create surface design with shaving cream.

Shaving cream marbling is fairly simple.

Put a layer of shaving cream in a low sided container that is slightly larger than your largest piece of paper. We used baking dishes, plastic container tops, and baking sheets with sides.  Smooth the top.

Put drops of color onto the shaving cream. This could be food color, acrylic inks or diluted acrylic craft paints.

Dots of color are added. 
In this picture, we had already taken one print and just added more color.

 

Use a chopstick or similar instrument and move the colors around on the surface of the shaving cream. The colors stay on the top of the shaving cream and you can form interesting patterns.

These photos show samples of how people moved the colors around.
 If you can see the shaving cream, the print will not have any color in that area.

Instead of a lot of back and forth movement of the color,
 many of our members made star or flower shapes.

Lay a piece of paper onto the surface of the shaving cream making sure not to have any bubbles under the paper.

Remove the paper from the shaving cream and use a straight edge (credit card, squeegee) to remove the cream from the paper. Done!

The paper looks a mess with shaving cream,
 but a couple swipes across the paper with a credit card and the design appears.

This is a TA-DA! moment.

If you notice, the room is not our usual room. We were in a conference room that had carpets on the floor. We swathed the room in white plastic. It was fun!

NEWPORT PAPER AND BOOK ART FESTIVAL - 2017

Fifteen members of NORBAG attended this year's festival, two of whom were also instructors. It is a wonderful experience just being with fellow book artists who understand what "book art" really is. Have you ever tried to explain what you do as a book artist? No one really understands – wish we could all just carry samples of our creations to share with the world.

Nye Beach on a sunny day...we only had one of those this year.

Here are just a few of the observations of this year's adventure and some miscellaneous photographs.

Margaret B (all the way from York, England):  Another weekend of crazy fun! Norbaggers do know how to have a good time and learn new things at the same time. Once again our condo was the hub for our nightly show and tell. Michele K shared sink art secrets and it was a place to catch up at the end of our busy days to exchange techniques, or just to watch the sun go down.  Nye beach at Newport is a delightful place and for the fifth year I was lucky enough to take a class in the room overlooking the beach on the one sunny day of our stay. Surf rolling in, families enjoying the beach, the lighthouse on the distant point and the seagulls overhead. The organization of the festival was first class as ever. Almost 100 attendees took 18 classes from 16 tutors over three days. And I was lucky enough to be one of them.

Examples from Marilyn Stablein's Explosion Class

 Pat C: I met a lot of nice people and the classes were fun and I've always learned a lot! Newport Paper and Book Arts Festival has something for everyone and is well worth the effort to attend.

One of Marilyn's books from the Instructor's Show

                                      

Edge G: Newport has been an inspiring, encouraging and fun experience for me. I've attended the last two years and plan to continue. Even though the instructors are well known and top notch I don't feel out of place as the instructors make everyone feel welcome and the classes are geared to a range of experience levels so everyone comes away satisfied. The setting in the Nye Beach area is beautiful and comfortably small, but not lacking in good restaurants and places to stay.  I feel very fortunate to be able to attend!

Examples of Tacket Binding from Margo Klass

Dolores G: Of the 14 participants in Margo Klass' two-day "Tacket Binding" class, seven of us were Norbaggers! Margo, who lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, is also a member of NORBAG. We always feel fortunate to be in her class as we come away with such scrumptious books. Michele K will be teaching one of the four variations we learned from Margo at our June workshop.

Dolores's beautiful book from the Instructor's Show

Bonnie J: Now that I'm an out-of-town member of NORBAG I really appreciate the opportunity to meet up with local members in Newport. It's almost like old times being able to attend workshops together again.  Several of us had rooms at the Condos so it was very convenient to get together in the evening to share techniques, get advice for finishing projects, and show off what we made in our workshops. Although it was a bit more wet and windy than we would have liked, some dedicated walkers still took a morning hike on the beach.

Mary Maisch's Word Bird from the Instructor's Show

Michele K: Newport was a great time as usual and made livelier this year by the addition of our member from York, England, Margaret. I always think of Newport as time for an art blast with my friends/art tribe. Kind of a prolonged slumber party with almost non-stop fun. At one point after all day workshops, Margaret remarked during our evening sink art session in the condo that the management would be quite shocked if they walked in right now. Fortunately we keep a clean scene with plastic covers and newspapers to keep the mess to a minimum. Fun times with creative outcomes.

Michele K's book made in Margo's Tacket Binding class

Cindy S: I took two days of workshops with Heather Fortner in Toledo at her studio. First day was "Beautiful Botanicals" and second day "Eco Dyeing." I enjoyed both classes and came away with such beautiful papers from the eco dyeing class that I will want to do more of this on my own. Loved the spontaneity of it.

Another Tacket Binding book

Carol S: This was my fourth year to attend this festival and it was such a fun and creative experience! I left feeling like a super saturated sponge. The event was well organized and the instructors had so much to share. Put NPBAF on your 2018 “to do list."

Baskets by Kathy Karbo in the Instructor's Show

Many thanks to Dolores for soliciting comments and writing this article. The dates for next year's NPBAF are April 20, 21, and 22. 

SHAVING CREAM MARBLING

Lara Cox will lead the May workshop to make marbled paper using shaving cream (that's right, SHAVING CREAM) and colorants such as food coloring and acrylic paints. You will come away from the workshop with many sheets of beautifully marbled paper for use in book arts. This art project is easy and fun!

A note on the shaving cream: Please avoid the super scented ones like Barbosol as the scent may linger on your paper for months. Also, since we will be working in a large group with lots of shaving cream we don't want to create a perfume scented overload for our senses. Please see the brand suggestions in the list below.

Here are examples of Lara's shaving cream marbled papers

What to bring:

• One can of Shaving cream (NOT GEL!) Lara recommends these brands from the Dollar Store: 1. Assured Men's Shave Cream (sensitive). It comes in a red can and has just a slight soapy smell. 2. Assured Ultra Rich Women's Shave Cream (sensitive). This is raspberry scented but not too strong and it comes in a fuchsia colored can.
• Colorants: Food coloring. Also, liquid acrylic paints for added interest.
• A shallow glass or plastic pan big enough to hold an 8 1/2 x 11" sheet of paper.
• A spatula to smooth the shaving cream.
• Chopsticks, Popsicle sticks or other similar tool for stirring.
• A small paint brush for spattering paint.
• Cardstock of various colors, including whites, pastels and brights.
• Paper towels
• Rubber gloves and an apron (not necessary but helpful)
• Mixing bowl sized container to hold used shaving cream

Meeting Details:

When:    Saturday, May 13 at 12 noon
Where:   Eureka Methodist Church, Del Norte & F Streets 
Room:     Fireside Room 8 - a different room than usual
RSVP:     YES! to Lara by May 10. Her contact information is in the newsletter.
Bring:     See the above list
Cost:      50 cents

Margaret Beech Workshop - Part 1

On Saturday, April 28, we had a delightful workshop with Margaret Beech. Margaret is from York, England and has been here five times since 2000. This year she came for the Newport Book Arts Festival, returned to Eureka, gave a workshop for all of us and then returned home on May 2nd. 

Margaret is a calligrapher and uses her calligraphy in many of her books. Her signature style is a simple structure in red, black and white with her calligraphy creating drama.  Margaret also works a bit ahead. She decided to save on postage and brought her exchange books for the rest of the year.  It was fun to hear from her about how these were made.

Our workshop started at 9:30 am and continued until 4:00 pm with twenty-seven attending. We had four books to construct: a double-sided flag book, an origami wallet, a double-sided two color cut out maze book and an origami box with a Tato lid. We had plenty of time to not only make the structures but also to have a very social meeting.

Many thanks to our members who arrived early to set up and stay late to take down all of the tables. We can't have meetings without their help. The workshop will be shown in two parts. The second part will be published on approximately May 15.

Margaret Beech at the table with her exchange books
 for the rest of the year.

From left to right, Kay C, Margaret, and Sandy V looking at Margaret's exchange books.

These are a few of the books that some of our members made
 at the Newport Paper and Books Arts Festival.

Double Sided - 2 Color Cut Out Maze Book

Our first book is a maze book made from a single sheet. We started out with a single sheet folded into 16 equal parts. We then folded a second slightly smaller sheet into another 16 parts and cut them out and glued them onto the first sheet.

We put all of our sheets into a press and finished them off in the afternoon.

Everyone had a different method of punching holes.

More and more holes.

Fold it up and this is what the little book looks like with
 different colors peeping through the holes.

Here is our table full of maze books.

Origami Box with Tato "Lid"

This lovely little box was a combination of two different structures. You can start with a "classic origami box" that can be found using that search term on the internet. The top of the box is called a "square origami envelope". Glued together, it is a delightful little structure that was originally done in an exchange book by Mary Elizabeth Nelson that Margaret received.

We will forgo showing you the classic origami box or how the square origami envelope is made. It's best to look at the instructions that can be found online. Instead, here is a look at how this delightful box opens.

 

The classic origami box is the pink base and the square origami envelope is slitted on the bottom and glued to the box. The top of the box is interwoven to hold it closed.

 

When you pull those top pieces apart, you end up with something like a pinwheel and see for the first time the colors on the reverse side of the paper (yellow)

 

Pull out those little pinwheel points and the whole inside of the original origami box shows.

 

Margaret doesn't let a single box be enough. She has nested nine boxes together and it is really quite lovely. Each box is made from paper one-half inch smaller than the previous box and is closed completely before closing the next one.

Here is a table of the little boxes and lids along with some of the flag books we made. On or about May 15 the blog will feature the flag book and "strip tease" wallet from Margaret's workshop.  

Don't forget. On May 15 (approximately) we will feature Part II of the workshop.