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Big Things Are Coming!

so keep a lookout around here

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more paste papers!

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Paste paper is a style of decorative paper historically used in bookbinding. It’s made by applying a mixture of flour paste and paint to a dampened sheet of paper and then manipulating it through brushing, combing, and other methods.

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these card pouches and zipper pulls are made out of salmon leather! the skins were acquired from a sushi shop and i tanned them in a super-concentrated tea tanning solution.

the card pouches are sewn with hemp thread as a nod to hemp fishing nets.

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a double-wall, extra-chunky custom clamshell chisel box for a client and his favorite chisel “BLUNDT”

it has a birdseye maple label and supports to keep the chisel locked in place when the box is closed.

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an 18th century calf quarter binding with a modern twist! the sides are a historic indigo sugar paper (so called because of its traditional use in wrapping sugar cones), and it has indigo sprinkled edge decoration and green and yellow sewn silk endbands

the calf leather on the spine has been dyed “sap green” with a historic dye made out of buckthorn berries

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finished Vita Nuova art nouveau-style fine binding!

peacock blue goatskin with crimson goatskin gold tooled-edge letters, gold tooled swirling lines, duck eggshell panel silhouette, crimson leather headbands, and hand-marbled paper (made by me)

(photos by Jenn Pellecchia)

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this is currently on exhibit at the north bennet street school in boston, massachusetts!

Atlantic Salmon Population Data in New England Rivers

The book is a salmon parchment-bound collection of data tables regarding salmon populations and management in New England rivers. Sewn onto the cover with fishing line are pieces of salmon parchment dyed in onion skins and stamped with the names of the data tables used. The edges are decorated in graphite, which adds to the shiny fishiness of the design. The endsheets are handmade paper with bits of plant material, which I thought evoked the feeling of standing in a river.

All of the salmon parchment used was made by me, the binder, out of skins procured from a local sushi shop.

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progress on my 18th century calf bindings

the blue edge is sprinkled with indigo, and the red one is brazilwood

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the yearning book. it’s a three-part leather bradel (black leather spine with “YEARNING” stamped in gray) with black leather headbands (stitched with yellow reminiscent of docs), rainbow marbled endpapers, and red/black checkered flannel covers. i made the bookcloth out of flannel and it’s so soft! you can rub your face against this book and hug it and feel nothing but joy.

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"#idk who’s gonna be searching tumblr for board reattachment posts but whatever it’s relevant" joke's on you, I first followed you recently because of the gorgeous Folklore Fish books, but that post comes at a perfect time, as I have a book falling apart in much the same way. I've been wondering if it might be worth it trying to actually fix it instead of barely holding the hinges together with book tape, I'll take your post as a sign to look into it. So far I've remained only in the realm of exposed bindings, which is what I'm able to do with a small budget to invest in tools, but I find it all very fascinating so, yes, board reattachment posts and the like are very welcome 😂

yeah, do it! please don’t use book tape. it just causes problems later on with adhesive and losses.

in the meantime, dry cleaning soot sponges are amazing for picking up dirt and debris, and you can make 4-flap enclosures to fit the books that you want to repair to hold them and store them without causing damage. all you really need to make those are some 20pt card and double-sided tape, a blade and a ruler, a bone folder and a cutting mat, and some triangles. and something you can poke holes with.

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no, it’s an eggshell panel!

you can make it by gluing eggshells to paper drummed around a board and then painting gesso into the cracks and sanding it. the gesso-sanding steps are repeated until it’s smooth.

i used duck eggs, which are thicker than chicken eggs and slightly translucent, which is why i used a white hahnemuhle ingres backing paper. they’re also a bit fluffier than chicken eggs when you beat them, and they made a tasty mushroom-feta scramble for dinner one night.

this is marbling (acrylic, gonna be the endsheets. made it last year)

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finally finished the tooling on vita nuova. now i just have to clean it up, actually attach the eggshell panel, and do the infills and endsheets.

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Atlantic Salmon Population Data in New England Rivers

The book is a salmon parchment-bound collection of data tables regarding salmon populations and management in New England rivers. Sewn onto the cover with fishing line are pieces of salmon parchment dyed in onion skins and stamped with the names of the data tables used. The edges are decorated in graphite, which adds to the shiny fishiness of the design. The endsheets are handmade paper with bits of plant material, which I thought evoked the feeling of standing in a river.

All of the salmon parchment used was made by me, the binder, out of skins procured from a local sushi shop.

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it’s a tooling day

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oh, it’s happening

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subtitle labels for my upcoming salmon data book

they will be stitched onto the salmon parchment cover with fishing line