Leatherbound Sketchbooks

I haven’t blogged about anything in awhile, so I figured I would grab something nearby and take some pictures of it. I completed this 3 book series a month or so ago. My goal was to make what in my mind would be the perfect sketchbook for a fine artist. I came up with these wide format, leatherbound, Rives BFK Gray notebooks. I have already gifted two of them to some very fine artists, and I am sure I will find someone to give the 3rd one to soon. I hope they will draw/paint/watercolor/gouache/doodle all over them, then let me borrow them so I can take some pictures of them worn, when I hope they will be more beautiful and just as intact.

Sourced Leather

Plans for the Flatback Hardcover

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Great American Dinosaurs

My latest work for Artist Books: A coptic bound piece dedicated to American Muscle Cars. The title page reads:

Great American Dinosaurs

The Muscle Cars of the 60’s and early 70’s were defined by their large engines, affordable price tag, and unmistakable style. They are, in many ways, a representation of America’s Golden Years: inefficient, yet nonetheless beautiful pieces of design and history. Times have rapidly changed, gas prices are an average of 32 times what they were in the 60’s, and these beautiful cars are becoming increasingly hard to find and expensive to maintain. As we grow exponentially closer to a time where fossil fuels are completely unaffordable, these artworks will become extinct.

This book is dedicated to the unique beauty of Muscle Cars and the designers who worked so passionately on them.

The book is 17 individual, single folio signatures with 11 sewing stations along the spine. It took me approximately one million years to bind and it tore in two small places, but overall I am satisfied with the result.

The cover was my first attempt at embossing something and I sort of wung it. I had the letterforms laser-cut from some bookboard and saved all of the negatives and counters. Then, I glued the remaining piece and counterforms on to another piece of book board, wrapped the whole thing in leather from the thrift store, and pressed it after placing the letterforms back in their respective spots on top of the leather. I think it worked out pretty nicely, though the embossed bits may be just a bit too deep. Something to keep in mind for next time.

Hit the “jump” for some more pictures! (CHECK OUT MY BLOG LINGO YO) (more…)

Sourcing Leather from Thrift Stores

I think material is really important in design. Exceptionally important. And yet, many designers don’t seem to pay much attention to it, doing all their work digitally and getting it printed on whatever paper Kinkos or MICA‘s print lab has readily available. I have been trying to use alternative materials in my work for some time now, most notably wood, and I have recently taken the dive into working with leather. I had looked into leather in the past, and was immediately and completely turned off by the price and partially by the fact that some nice animals would be laying down their lives for my work. However, I recently visited my local thrift store in search of leather garments I could recycle into my work, and it was much more successful and rewarding than I expected. The variety and quality of the leather found in all sorts of stylish coats, pants, and shirts amazed and excited me. Not to mention the price was more than right.

I got all of the clothes you see pictured above and below for under $30 on half off Sundays at the Village. I managed to get a wide variety of color, finish, and thickness that should prove useful for all sorts of applications. I am ALL about recycling materials, and this was unbelievably cheap and will hopefully get turned into a plethora of very classy, professional looking things.

A few tips if you plan on getting some leather from your local thrift store:

• Check tags and use the smell test to make sure you are dealing with genuine leather and not some shitty pleather
• Pay attention to the size of the panels in the garments, a giant trench coat made entirely of small pieces is more or less worthless
• You will find exponentially more leather in womens clothes than mens

The reason this kind of re-appropriation is so exciting is because its like a scavenger hunt. Its almost as though you are living in some MMORPG when you find some beautiful pair of burgundy leather pants, because you know that whatever you make out of those pants will be one-of-a-kind. Your book cover, or whatever, will have the embedded history of a nice cow, and a bunch of people from the 80′s, tacked onto it. Beautiful.

Flat-Back Hardcover Book Structure

Image on Flickr

These are my class “notes” on the flat-back hardcover structure for Gail Deery’s Papermaking and Book Structure class. If anyone is interested in the .pdf let me know.

Ampersand Book

My latest book for Laurie Snyder’s Artist’s Books class. Yeeeeaaaahhhhhhh it’s a little typical-graphic-design-student-project-ey, but I do not care. I went through all 900+ fonts on my computer and selected what I find to be some of the most interesting, beautiful, or historically significant ampersands. Paired with their designer and in chronological order, all the way from Bembo in 1495 to Jos Buivenga’s FREE Delicious, designed just last year. They were transferred from laser prints with wintergreen oil onto tan Rives BFK, and bound accordion fold style with some sourced leather covers (I hope to write an article about sourcing leather soon).

This was my first time working with leather or oil transfers, and both processes were very rewarding. I love the texture created by the transfer, and the leather was a lot easier to work with and acquire affordably than I anticipated. I think I will be doing more work with both of them in the future.

Detail shots in the unabridged post.

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Press Name

Laurie Snyder, professor of my Artist’s Books class, has encouraged us to create a “press name”, basically a pseudonym we put on each of our pieces. I think I am going to use this as an opportunity to make a stamp, something which I have wanted to do for awhile now. I had a little fun playing with my name “Andy” and this beautiful Baskerville italic ampersand. I think this thing is totally ridiculous and silly, but an elegant form nonetheless. It will make a nice, semi-anonymous sign off to each of my books I think.

Product Review: Bessey D-BKWH Quick-Change Folding Utility Knife

It has recently occurred to me that one of the biggest reasons I am a Book Arts Concentrator may be as an excuse to own a slew of nice, bookmaking tools. Though I have used many a utility knife in my day and borrowed a few from my father, I had never bought my own. So, realizing that a proper book makers kit needed one, I set about shopping around to find a good knife I can keep with me, hopefully forever. I settled on the Bessey D-BKWH Quick-Change Folding Utility Knife, with the hard wood handle of course. I figured I would post up some large, detailed images of it and write a quick review to help anyone who may be shopping around in the utility knife department. (more…)

Thoughts (DRAFT)

This is my one-week-book from last week’s Artist’s Books class; I am only posting it now because I lost it the day of class last week and only just found it again! We had to make a simple, pamphlet-bound book from one 11×17 sheet of paper printed on both sides. When it came time to do this, I had been thinking a lot about relationships, and the truly unbelievable things people say when they are entrenched in them. The contents of this book is an email I wrote, but never sent, to my first “girlfriend” during freshman year of high school. (Thanks for archiving every little thing, Gmail!) For me, this book is about sharing everything about myself. I always preach honesty, and I think it is probably the single most important thing to me. Honesty is easy when you aren’t ashamed of anything, but the contents of this book is something I am truly embarassed I ever thought/wrote. I figure if I can be honest about these things to anybody and everybody, I am upholding my end of the honesty bargain. (more…)

My Tools

This is my latest project for my Artist’s Books class. The assignment was to bind together atleast 8 of something at a single point. Usually, this style of binding ends up functioning like a booklet of paint swatches, fanning out to be read. My book is all about the tools I use to create; it is both a reaction to my being the only male in my book arts class and people who assume design is synonymous with digital.

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Jack of All Trades Leonard Baskin

Copyright for this image is held by the Estate of Leonard Baskin

I was asked by my Paper Making and Book Structure professor to research the work of Leonard Baskin: Printmaker, Sculptor, Designer, Bookmaker, and all around BAMF. I have found his creative path through life to be similar to my own thusfar, we share both a passion for design and a love of true craftsmanship and the object as a form of Art. (more…)