Paper and Threads

CREATING THE NEW PAGE BLOCK

It is now time to put your folios together to make signatures.  If you are using 140 lb watercolor paper, 2 folios per signature is the most I use.  However, I add pages from the original book to some or all of the signatures, but not more than one old page per signature.

The sewing method that I use is a little complicated.  I follow the diagrams created by my friend Martha in a tutorial about making a watercolor sketchbook from a Moleskine Yearly Date Book.  And I put her instructions in front of me while I sew.  They are included below for you to use.

Making the Holes in the Signatures

We will make a pattern (called a jig) to plan the placement of 5 holes.  I use a strip of cardstock that is the exact height of my signatures and 4" wide, but you can use any sturdy paper  I fold the piece lengthwise and put clearly marked dots on the inside, on the fold, at the following places:  1" from each end, in the middle, and then halfway between the middle and outer dots.

Punching the Holes

A cheap book binding cradle can be made from your telephone book (Thank you Gwen Diehn).  Open the book down the middle, put the fold of the signature into the fold of the telephone book, and then line up your jig over the signature.  Match the top edge of your signature and the jig so your holes will line up on all signatures.  Use an awl or a big sharp needle to make a hole through each dot.  Here is my signature being punched.

Punch the holes carefully and keep the folios together so the holes will line up as well as possible when you get ready to sew them.

Arrange your signatures in the order in which they will be sewn into the page block.  I always have the original title page, unless it was damaged, on the outside of the first signature.  Mark the signatures, with pencil, in the top right corner.  Mark your last signature (on the bottom) with an A The one on top of that is B, and on top of that is C, etc.  I had 5 signatures marked E, D, C, B, A from top to bottom in my pile.

Sewing Supplies

These are the supplies that I use for stitching the signatures together.  The yellow object on the top of the photo is sewer's beeswax.  You may run your thread through beeswax in order to make it less likely to tangle.  I forget to do it more than half the time and I'm therefore a bad judge of whether it makes a huge difference

Sewing the Signatures Together 

Cut a piece of thread that is the height of your signatures X the number of signatures.  My Venice book had 5 signatures and was 8" high, so my thread was at least 40".  I tend to add a little more because I NEVER want to run out of thread while I'm sewing the signatures together,

When you stitch the signatures together, pull the thread tight, without stressing the paper or the holes.  And check freuently to make sure that you haven't left any big loops of thread that weren't pulled all the way through.  This stitching sequence requires your full attention, but only takes about 20-30 minutes.  I banish my husband from the room because I need to remember where I am in the instructions.  I have had to pull out the thread on more than one occasion!  Print out the stitching sequence pages, or keep your computer open in front of you and follow them precisely.

Stitching Sequence: 

These instructions were copied from Trumpetvine Travel with her permission.  They are a modification of the stitching used for Coptic books, so if you master this you can make another popular type of multiple signature book that also opens flat.

Thread the needle with   a single strand and leave one tail longer than the other.  Do not knot the end.

Get the signature marked A from the bottom of your pile.  Then follow these instructions exactly. 

The knots and the ends will be glued later.

The Page Block 

Here is the completed page block, with 5 rows of stitching sewing the signatures together.  There re less complicated methods, but I enjoy the sewing process and feel as if my book will never fall apart.  In addition, I am always fighting the gaps between signatures and with these heavy papers, the gaps are impossible to eliminate completely.

This is the appearance of the stitches on the inside of the signatures.

 Here is an example of the gaps in this book. 

Gluing the spine, which we will do next, closes them a little.  In some of my early books, I glued a 1 1/2"strip of paper, which I also used for the end papers, over the gap.  You may choose to skip the spine gluing process for your first book and cover the gaps with decorative paper.  Tt will be your choice.

Tipping on the End Papers:

The end papers are made from a decorative piece of paper - again making sure that you know the grain of the paper and putting the grainline of the end paper parallel to the spine. 

Cut two folios exactly the same size as the watercolor paper folios and fold them right sides together.

Here is my sheet for the end papers and a folio from the old book lying on top.

Here are the folded end papers that will be glued to the front and back of the page block.

I have made every mistake that it is possible to make in this process.  But one that I made twice, is to attach the end papers upside down.  It is important that you make sure that you lay your end papers on top of your page block and write top in the upper right corner of each.  Otherwise your end papers may read correctly, but the title page of your new book may be upside down and at the back of the page block.  Here is an example of the correct orientation.

Lay a piece of wax paper a scant 1/4" from the fold of the end paper.  Using a small flat brush, put PVA glue along the paper edge along the fold, protecting the rest of the end paper with the wax paper.  Then place the end paper, glue side down on the front of the book, IN THE CORRECT DIRECTION.  Use your bone folder to make sure that there are no bubbles and that the paper is well adhered.  Repeat with the second end paper.

Place weights of the page block, until the glue on the end papers is dry.

Gluing the Spine  (Optional)  You may not mind the gaps, or you may decide to cover them with strips of decorative paper.

You need to put your page block between two sheets of wax paper and put heavy weights (I use two plastic wrapped bricks) on top of the spine to compress the signatures.  The wax paper should extend at least one inch outside the weights and the spine should extend about 1/8th inch.

The spine is glued with PVA glue and a stiff, flat brush, dotting the folds to try to work some glue SLIGHTLY in between the folds. 

In the following photos you will see that I have lots of weights on top of my page block - a board, 2 five pound exercise weights, and my two bricks.  This is probably overkill. 

Here are the materials that will be glued onto the spine - rice paper on the left and mull on the right.  It is also possible to use clean cotton fabric, like muslin instead of the paper and mull.

Then a 1 1/4" strip of rice paper (slightly narrower than the spine) is glued on top of the spine,

And finally, a 2 1/2" piece of mull is glued in place. 

Let the glue dry and brush one final layer of glue on top.  Don't remove the page block from the weights until the glue is completely dry. 

The wax paper will be peeled off and the page block will be glued into the old book cover in the final section!

Posted by Shirley at 7:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

The new American Wing Galleries just opened at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the space is amazing.  I realized that I know very little about early American Art and, but quickly realized that I don't especially like the realism and preponderance of portraits and landscapes.  I do love Winslow Homer watercolors and couldn't find one.  Maybe when the collection is expanded to include more 20th C. artists, I will fall in love....  My one sketch for the visit was from a marble urn with 2 American Indians perched on the sides.  I sketched one of them at the Museum and painted him at home - purely from my imagination since he was sculpted in white marble.

I had my 3rd lesson by Jane Davies on Self-Portraits and just had to show you the results of my loosening up exercise.  These were blind contours - some as one-liners and others not.  I giggled when I looked down after each one....  I actually like the wonkiness of blind contour drawings, but I've never been sure that I gained much from doing them - except having fun.

Posted by Shirley at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

This part of the tutorial will cover:

1-A.  Removing the old page block from the purchased book

1-B.  Collecting folios from the old book that you want to put in the sketchbook

1-C.  Tearing down watercolor paper and creating signatures

Some Useful Definitions for Part 1

A folio is the full size page that gets folded in half to make up the signatures.  Each folio will make 4 single-sided pages in the book.

A signature is a collection of folios, all folded together.  I use 140 lb watercolor paper and only two folios can be put in each signature.

Grain is the orientation of the fibers in the paper - very much like fabric.  Handmade papers don't have grain.  When making a book, the grain of the paper needs to be parallel to the spine of the book unless you want a wonky book.  This is the first and last rule of bookbinding.

Part 1-A:  Removing the Old Page Block

Using a small craft/X-acto knife, carefully cut down the fold between the cover and the first page (the end paper).  I have been too vigorous and sliced a small part of the book cover on one book, so do this slowly and carefully.  I sometimes use my fingernail to see if I can cut through the fold without a knife, at least to get the cut started so then I can see into the opening a little better.  Do both sides and remove the old page block.

This is what the book cover should look like after you remove the page block.

Take a small pair of scissors and clean up both edges.

This is how the old book cover should look at this point in the process.

Part 1-B.  Collecting folios from the old book that you want to put in the sketchbook

I like to retain some of the old book pages, if they pertain to my future use of the book.  If they don't, I at least try to include the old title page to honor the old book.  Sometimes, however, the spine is so heavily glued, that you can't tease away many folios from the page block.

In this book, I wanted to save the title page and some of the lovely photos and quotes.  The spine was heavily glued, so instead of picking at it until I could remove the glue in small pieces (frequently damaging the fold of the folios in the process), I cut the signatures apart.

When you look at each page in a signature in a book, there is one double page spread that is the center fold of the signature.  Here you can see the stitches that are holding the signatures together.  In this book, I cut all of these big stitches and carefully lifted off the top few folios.  This gave me the title page and a few signatures to add to my Venice sketchbook. 

Here are several folios that I removed to add to my sketchbook.

Note that you will get some pages that you don't want, because they are part of the folio containing the page that you do want.  I use them to add photos, collage, trip ephemera, gesso and more drawings, etc.  In this case I will leave them because they are photos of other parts of Italy and I like all of them.

Now the folio you remove must be carefully measured to determine the size of your new watercolor pages.

My folio measured 13 15/16ths inches wide and 8 inches high.  This will need to be the size of your watercolor folios.  I use Fabriano Artistico Extra-white, 140 lb, soft press paper.  Several years ago Fabriano changed their product so the grain of the paper is parallel to the 22" side of a 22" by 30" sheet.  In paper parlance, this is called grain short.  Arches paper is grain long. 

I was able to cut two folios from the width of the paper and only four  total from each watercolor sheet.  But I tore the paper leaving a 6" X 30" wide strip across the bottom of the sheet - and I now have a small accordion notebook for preliminary sketches before our trip from each sheet.

Here is a Venice folio that I want to include in my book, followed by the title page.

And here is my book cover with the folios that I want to use.  The remainder of the page block is now in my collage bin for future projects.

In the next part we will tear down or cut the watercolor paper and the end papers.  The spine of my old book is 3/4" wide and I used 2 sheets of 140 lb paper, several folios from the old book, and two smaller pieces of watercolor paper that I had leftover from another project. 

You will need to have your desired paper, a decorative paper for the end papers, a solid 24" ruler or straight edge, a bone folder and heavy books to use as weights.

Part 1-C:  Tearing down watercolor paper and creating signatures

When you buy your watercolor paper, ask the most knowledgeable sales person for the direction of the grain of the paper and put a small arrow, in pencil, along the edge so you remember it.  Most of the other watercolor paper manufacturers (like Arches) make papers that are "grain-long," meaning the grain is parallel to the long (30") edge.

There is a way to determine the grain for yourself - but it takes a little practice. 

Determining the Grain

Lay the sheet of paper in front of you and try to fold the paper,  first one direction, and then the other.  But only bring over the edge of the paper, DON'T ACTUALLY FOLD IT.  Bounce your hand on the paper trying to feel the resistance and note the direction for the LEAST resistance.  The grain runs parallel to the soft fold when you feel the least resistance. Mark it in pencil on the sheet of paper.

Here is a photo of me bouncing the paper when trying to determine the grain.

Making the Folios

Beginners may wish to cut their folios with a metal ruler and a craft knife.  That is what I did for the first few books that I recycled.  Now I prefer tearing my pages to get a faux deckled edge on the pages.

To tear the paper into folios:  Measure and lightly mark dots for the cuts on the watercolor sheet.  Place a metal ruler between the dots, and score the paper along the ruler with the pointed edge of the bone folder.  I go over the same line 4-5 times.  Then fold the paper along that line and use the bone folder to compress the fold down the entire length, on both sides of the fold.  Next I fold the paper in the opposite direction along the same line - burnishing the fold again on both sides. 

Here is my well folded and burnished fold and my bone folder.

Insert the bone folder into the fold and gently "wiggle it", pulling along the fold to get the paper to tear.  This is very easy after you practice, so take some other scrap papers and try it until you are happy with the result.

For this book I used 2 22 X 30" sheets of watercolor paper and made 8 folios plus my two 6X30" accordion practice booklets. 

Making the Signatures

Fold each folio in half and lightly burnish the fold on both sides.  Then take 2 folios and nestle them together to make a signature.  If you are using 90 lb watercolor paper, you will be able to put more folios in each signature and need more signatures to fill the book spine. 

For this book, I decided to add several folios from the original book and several smaller pieces of watercolor paper, left over from other projects.  I like having odd little pieces appear randomly in travel sketchbooks.  I might use them for business cards or lists or as a tab to attach photos on our return. 

Here is a photo with one of my added small pieces of watercolor paper - folded asymmetrically.

When I rearranged all of these extra pieces, I actually had 5 signatures for my book, each with 2 folios of watercolor paper and one folio from the original book.  And when I put all of the signatures inside my book, they filled the spine of the old cover perfectly.

Cutting the end papers

End papers are the "hinge" to put your new page block in your old cover.  Have some fun picking them out, but make sure that you pick sturdy paper.  I love to carry the theme of the book through to the end papers and had this piece of paper in my stash - just waiting for this project. 

You must determine the grain of this paper and then cut (not tear) two folios the same size as your watercolor paper.  For me that was 13 15/16th inches wide and 8 inches high.  Then fold them in half, right sides together, until we need them in Part 2.

Now pile up all of your signatures and put them under heavy weights to further compress the folds until you are ready to stitch them together.  I wrapped two cheap bricks in plastic and taped them up to use as my regular weights, but any heavy objects are fine.

In Part 2, we will stitch together the signatures, tip (i.e. glue) on the end papers, and  glue the spine. You will need linen or heavy duty thread (some people have even used dental floss), a needle, an awl (or something to make small holes with), PVA glue (some people use white craft glue), wax paper, and a glue brush.

In Part 3, we will case-in the book (i.e. glue one page of the end paper to the inside front and back old book covers.  No new supplies are needed. 

After drying the glue overnight, under heavy weights, you will have a watercolor sketchbook, in the size you want, and with the paper you like best!

Posted by Shirley at 7:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (13)

When I was making my Venice Sketchbook, I folded two strips of watercolor waste paper so I can do some preliminary sketching from photos.  These are mainly photos that I took on previous visits, before I started drawing again.  Scroll down to yesterday's blog post for information about the Venice Sketchbook.

I adore Venice, but worried that I could be overwhelmed by the architecture (very complex) and water (which I don't really know how to paint).  Here are the three sections I did so far.

I love this architecture - and sketched the upper balcony from a photo of the Doge's Palace. 

My first attempt at dealing with Canal water, and what better for drawing than the Rialto Bridge.

I love the masks that are historically significant in Venice and as a physician really think the Plague Doctor costume is fantastic.  The beak contained medicinal herbs and other things to try to prevent contracting plague.

The Campanile was another architectural challenge and a time for me to see if I have some of the right colors of paint and watercolor pencils.  The bricks were painted with a mahogany Caran D'Ache watercolor pencil.

Posted by Shirley at 12:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Posted by Shirley at 8:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)