Fabric Covered Books

After attending the 'Proper Book' course at Hot Bed Press, I have been experimenting with making hand made books. I tried covering some I made with offcuts of my daughter Rosie's screen printed fabrics. As they proved quite successful, I made 6 to take to the Renegade Craft Fair at Brick Lane, Spitalfields where Rosie had a stand last weekend. 

 We sold two!

Margaret Street Printroom

I have been lucky enough to get a placement as Artist in Residence in the printroom at BCU, Margaret Street. I am currently half way through the 3 month residency. A couple of months back I was photographed in the printroom as part of a promotion for the university. I am printing from a copper plate etching.

Pulpa Exhibition

I'm taking part in a group exhibition at the R K Burt Gallery in Southwark. It has been organised by some of the PhD students at BCU. All the work is paper-based, R K Burt being a paper merchants.

I went down to help with the instal. The gallery is at the front of the paper merchants. It looks like it was formally a shop and is on two floors.

The prints I decided to show at the exhibition were 'The Fireman and Flash Gordon' and 'The Ice Skaters'.

Dovecote Garden Wood Blocks

Back in the summer I produced some engraved wood blocks based on plants that grow in the Dovecote Garden. Visitors to my 'Moseley Stories' exhibition could use them to produce their own prints with water-based black printing ink.

Today I used oil-based printing inks and Japanese gampi paper to produce a selection of prints that I could collage onto thicker paper or card.

Wood Engraved Letters

I have been making a set of wood engraved letters to celebrate the birth of my granddaughter Elizabeth. On Friday I tried the first proof print at the Parkside print room .

When the blocks were inked up, there was some areas of cut block that were catching the roller and needed to be cut away more to stop any unwanted marks appearing on the finished print. Once this was done I produced a set of prints in various autumnal colours.

Book Making at Hot Bed Press

Here are some of the photos I took of 'The Proper Book' course at Hot Bed Press last weekend. The course was run by Elizabeth Willow.

 The course finished with the completion of a hard bound book which was of a very professional finish. 

Hot Bed Press, Manchester

Over the weekend I attended a course at Hot Bed Press in Manchester (Salford to be exact). I was very impressed with their studios, notably with the amount of space they had and how well each area was organised.