Apprentice Gift

I took on my second apprentice this weekend at Solstice Court in the Barony of Loch Salann. HL Cathryn Anne of Newbury is a lovely lady with some wonderful embroidery skills. I'm incredibly honored to be able to work with her.

In honor of this event, I made and gifted her with a hand-bound book, so that she may journal about her artistic endeavors, document what she wants to, and hopefully indicate areas that she enjoyed and things she'd do differently for the next project. So much of what she does ends up given away due to her generous nature, so I want her to keep track of what she's doing.

I crafted the covers with chipboard covered in goat skin, that has been stamped and dyed to look like snake skin. This is not a period practice as far as I know (leatherwork is not an area of study for me...yet), but the end result is lovely and frankly, I liked it (though it proves to be incredibly difficult to photograph). The bindings are done in coptic stitch out of green waxed cotton. The end papers are also green. Green is the color oft used to signify an apprentice/laurel relationship, so this was why I chose this color.

Non-Traditional SCA Award

I was asked to prepare a Golden Pillar of Artemisia award scroll for HE Asgierr, a dear friend. I debated for some time whether to make a traditional scroll, something "new to me" style-wise, or something non-traditional.  I opted for non-traditional, and decided to make a hand-bound book, since I did a traditional one for Asgierr just last year.

St. Cuthbert Gospel, British Library

I was inspired by the St. Cuthbert Gospel, an early 8th Century manuscript (British Library Add MS 89000).  The St. Cuthbert Gospel is not only a phenomenal piece of work, but is the earliest intact European example of bookbinding.

The British Library's blog has a fascinating post here about results of X-Rays and CT scans of the book. Previously, attempts at duplicating the bindings included using leather or rope for the raised design. The CT Scans make it clear that the design is made out of a clay-like substance. Mine is not a replication of this book, not by far! But the design concepts are what got my brain ticking.

I started off in traditional fashion by cutting out pages, and folding them into quires of five or so pages each. I then wrote the scroll text, loosely based on/inspired by the intro to Beowulf. I give full credit to THL Colyne Stewart for this blog post at The Scriptorium for the inspiration.

I translated the wording into runes - yes, the English decoder-ring style runes. Please don't hate. I know this is not a period practice, but I knew the recipient would love this. I then wrote out said runes on pages 2 and 3 of the first quire. I left page 1 blank, because every book I've made, without exception, gets glued to the end page at least 1/4 inch up.

For Christmas last month, I was given a hand-made stitching frame from my parents. My father is a brilliant craftsman (he also made my book press). I'm a lucky girl. Click the images to see larger versions.

I used a simple twine for my sewing cords, and waxed linen thread to stitch the quires together. This was my first time using a stitching frame, and it makes some things easier, and some things more difficult. I imagine it would make life much better when making a huge book, but for a tiny thing like this, it's really not that necessary. I did like practicing on it though!

Once the quires were stitched together, I pressed them into the book press, and used a light hammer to round out the spine a bit, and prepare it for gluing. To be honest, I need to do more reading as to the period practice of reinforcing the spine at this step in medieval bookbinding, but for this book I used a small strip of linen for reinforcement, and used PVA glue. When that was dry, I added pre-made headbands (not pictured).

I left that to dry, and set about making a raised design to add to the cover. Due to the timeline, researching and recreating period sculpting clay or gesso was not feasible. Additionally, my bookboard was slated to be pieces of chipboard rather than actual wood, which changes the scope of the project as well. 

My dear husband suggested I use sculpy - it's lightweight, fast to cure, and would never show under the leather binding. Pretty much a perfect idea.

I sculpted pieces that comprise a Valknut, a Norse symbol of importance to the recipient.

I'd never used sculpy before, and found it difficult to maintain sharp smooth edges when trying to move it from my cutting board over onto the silicone baking sheet. I crossed my fingers and hoped that covering the whole thing in leather would hide some of my sins.

I covered the text block with paper to protect it from stray glue, and covered the book in a supple brown goat skin. I used small manicure tools and a bookbinding spatula to push the leather into the nooks and crannies of the Valknut. When that was completely dry, I added red end papers (not pictured) and called it good!

Text Translation:

Lo, praise the labor of Artemisians;

Of strong-armed Danes, in days long sped - we have heard!

And what honor the Northman gives!

Oft Asgierr Rekke I Dane from unseen Quarters 

aids many a tribe, house and nobles-all.

Never he rests, always seeking duty done.

Famed is this Asgierr, far flies the boast of him,

Son of the Dane in the Gryphon Lands.

So comes to this great man, recognition of Jarls

From hands of the good Tsar called Lakhan, 

And Tsarista Vigdis, come honors.

Named as a Pillar, Golden and cherished, this hall-sung hero.

Done this fourteenth day of January in the Fifty-first year of the Society,

Being 2017 in the Common Era.

Lakhan, Tsar

Vigdis, Tsarista

Things I'd do differently next time?

1. Leave more of a border on the left side of the text. It worked out, but my eyes would like a bit more white space.
2. Start on page 3 instead of 2. An extra blank page at the beginning would be a good thing, since page 1 actually becomes part of the endpaper.
3. Use wood or a heavier bookboard, and do that research on period clay stuff!
4. Dilute the glue more when working on fiddly cover bits. If it gets too sticky too soon, that's no bueno. The extra work time will help in stretching the leather over the spine as well - I felt this was a bit too loose.
5. Take the time to press the final book for 24 hours.

Largesse - Another tiny book

Our kingdom made a call for largesse to provide for the 50 year celebration of the SCA (kind of a big deal). I had all kinds of plans to make a fancy schmancy book with the device/symbol chosen by Their Majesties of Northshield to commemorate their reign. Sadly, reality had to hit me eventually. The largesse display was at Quest this last weekend, and time had run out. I did manage to finish one of my cute tiny books, so that had to be my little contribution.

My heart is big, but my crafting is slow. I was also working on two scrolls, so that ate into my time a bit.

Special thanks to my hubby who acted as my "hand model" to show off the size and scope of this book.

These little things are the perfect size for taking notes during circles. This one is covered in a lovely blue suede, and is kind of "first cousins" to the books I made for largesse last year. One even has the same leather cover, but this has square corners instead of round!

Test-Run Coptic Stitch

With my upcoming class at KWHSS, I thought I'd better time how long it takes me to assemble a book using my pre-cut templates, to make sure we'll be able to finish a book in the 55 minute class limit.

Turns out that's a nope. It took about 1 hour from start to finish, with me already knowing the process. This book is 4.5" x 5.5", with five signatures. I'm going to have to trim time off by prepping more materials in advance, such as gluing the covers together (saves 10 minutes!), and possibly pre-folding all the signatures (groan), to allow time for explaining the process and giving students time to make mistakes and fix them. It's important to finish the book in the class because the final stitches are different, for attaching the cover.

I'm disappointed, but glad I did this so my class isn't a big fat fail. I also learned that my screw punch has issues and people are going to have to share hole punches for the covers. This should get interesting... (Anyone have a 1/16 or 1/8" hole punch they want to lend me for a day?)

I also need to remind myself to pick up more wide-mouthed needles and pencils. I am also now the proud owner of a ton of glue sticks that my students will no longer get to play with.

Awls

I'm teaching a class on coptic stitch bookbinding at Known World Heraldic and Scribes Symposium this month. Since we only have 55 minutes to completely construct a book, each student will need a full set of the tools needed, as there will be no time for sharing.

An important tool in bookbinding is an awl, for punching stitching holes in the signatures (bundles of folios). There are many kinds of awls, from scratch awls, tailors awls, punch awls, and more. For bookbinding, pretty much any will work so long as it's straight and not a tapered awl (you want your holes to be of a consistent size).

I'm not rich, and awls can get expensive quickly if you're providing a dozen or so of them. So this was my ghetto-fab fix.

I used 3" roofing nails. They're not as sharp nor tapered as smoothly as a proper awl, but they'll work. I then made little handles for them using Sugru. Sugru is an awesome mouldable glue. It acts like clay, and when it cures, it's a hardened rubber plastic. These little handles will help my students push and pull their awls through signatures.

Persona Research Challenge - 2nd Prize

The second prize winner of the Artemisian Persona Research Challenge was m'lady Cheung Mei Wan for her article on Chinese hair ornaments.

She requested that her book have blank pages, and be bound in this lovely red brocade, which she provided to me. To bind books in fabric, you must use a process which will allow you to use glue on it without destroying the fabric itself. There are complicated ways of soaking the fabric in starch and paste, but I was afraid the Brocade would become water damaged from the pasting. It was also important to me to get this book done soon, as it's taken me longer to finish than I'd hoped. Life seems to get in the way of fun sometimes. I opted for a simple, quick and very not period method of backing the fabric with tissue paper using Heat 'n' Bond. I want to take the time to do testing on making book fabric "properly" in the future. 

This book is done in coptic stitch binding, which leaves the signatures visible on the spine, and shows a decorative stitch along the signatures. I did this using waxed cotton embroidery floss. It's a lot more wobbly than I'd prefer - clearly I need more practice. This book has 11 signatures.

The benefit to coptic stitch binding is that no glue is needed in attaching the covers to the body of the book, and books lay flat when open, which is great for writing and sketching. Incidentally, I'm supposed to be teaching a class on coptic stitch binding at Known World Heralds and Scribes Symposium next month. If you're there, come to my class or come say hi!

I used a heavy weight pearlescent paper with embossed floral designs for the inside of the covers. This reminded me of the papers used in the recipient's wedding bouquets, so I thought it would be a fun little personalized touch.

I finished the book off by adding metal corners to the outer edges. The inner edges could not be capped due to the binding stitches. I had some fraying problems with the fabric where the corners were turned in, so this helps keep everything tight where it should be. The glue used will keep the book from further fraying, but this looks much cleaner.

Persona Research Challenge - 1st Prize

My husband, Sven, is head of the Scholar's Guild in the Barony of Gryphon's Lair. With Their Majesties' support, he ran a Kingdom-wide Persona challenge wherein the entrants were to identify an art form that was used during their persona's timeline, and share five document-able facts about that art. This was the second challenge he's run.

He asked me if I would be willing to make prizes for the first and second place winners. Specifically, books! The idea was that the winners would work directly with me to indicate what kind of book they would want. 

Lord Cynric of Defnascir won first place with a well-written article on pattern welding. He wanted a book with lined paper, and chose the green goatskin leather from my stash for the cover. As this is the same goatskin I used for Master Aaron's vigil book, I did a few things to make this one different and unique.

Cynric wanted lined pages, so I created the lined paper with custom spacing and color (dark green), and printed it out double-sided on a high quality smooth finish paper. for making the signatures.

The spine has only two corded tabs rather than four, as on Aaron's book. This is still plenty secure, as I used four lengths of twine on each, rather than two. This makes the bump on the spine more pronounced (I like this look),, and gave me plenty of twine to work with when securing it to the bookboard.

His personal device sports a rampant horse, so I attached a silver horse pendant to the bookmark, giving it a bit of "Cynric flair."

This was the first time I've tried using metal corners. I fear they may fall off one day, but only time will tell. I adhered them to the corners using some PVA glue, and compressing the metal with pliers. I suspect such ornamentation in period would have been custom crafted and probably tacked in with nails or screws - I must do more research into this. While I'm very much enjoying bookbinding, I'm still quite new to it. This is only my fourth book, and my second of this size.

I'm well pleased with how the headbands turned out on this book. Headbands are designed to keep dust from getting down into the spine of the book. I bought a length of commercial headband that you trim to size and adhere into place on the spine prior to covering the book. One day I'll try my hand at making my own headband by sewing directly onto the spine.

The endpapers are a red linen textured paper chosen from my stash by Lord Cynric. Endpapers are usually a full signature in width, but in this case they are only half that.

Vigil Book

Adventures in bookbinding! I must admit this is a new obsession for me. When His Excellency, Don Aaron Carter was included as one of the three Premier members of the Order of the Masters of Defense for Artemisia, I was thrilled. Aaron is an amazing man! My dear husband raised my hand for me, offering me to do his vigil book. I'm still really shy about this skill as I'm so new to it, but when he said yes, I did a happy dance.


Aaron's device is green and has wagon wheels on it, so I was not surprised when he asked for the book to be green. I managed to find some vintage wagon wheel buttons to incorporate into the design as well.

As I don't tool leather (...yet, she says cautiously), I was extremely happy to find a piece green goat skin suitable to bind the book.

The paper is a higher quality standard copy paper. 32lb, if I recall correctly, with a nice creamy texture. My quest to find a high quality paper that doesn't have annoying watermarks continues.

I hand folded the signatures, hand punched the binding holes, and hand stitched the signatures together with waxed linen thread.

My father made me a book press, which I then used to shape the spine into a curve. After that, I glued on a silk ribbon for a bookmark, headbands, and used cotton muslin as a spine cover thingy... I'm not sure the technical term for this bit is. Time to crack open my books again!

I then attached book board (an ugly, undocumented process), and carefully stretched the goat skin over the book board. Mid-way through this process, I sewed on the button, glued in a strap, and finished the cover with a deep sigh of relief that my strap/button plan worked.

The end papers are a white embossed pearlescent scrapbook paper that I decided were perfect based on the fact that Aaron's elevation garb was to be all white satin, dripping in pearls. A touch of foreshadowing, if you will.

Notebook Largesse

When our glorious Majesties of Artemisia announced they would be travelling to Avacal for their premier coronation, and requested largesse to take for the occasion, I knew exactly what I wanted to make. Hand-bound notebooks, covered in leather.

As I was also in the process of beginning to make a vigil book for a friend (a post to come later), I decided to practice my meager bookbinding skills by making a few small notebooks. Killing two birds with one stone, you see.

The first, as you can see, is bound in a smooth supple tan leather, and the signatures are made of a taupe high quality paper. The end papers are pieces of scrapbook paper that I thought was pretty. Queue my obsession with the classic damask pattern.

The signatures are hand stitched with waxed linen thread, and bound with linen and twine on the inside spine. The book board is simple cardboard, but certainly sufficient for such small books.

The second was covered in some powder blue suede, and the signatures are a plain white paper. Its end papers are similar to the first, but the colors are grey and white. I rounded the corners of the cover of the blue book, and I quite like the look. I neglected to take pictures of the second book prior to handing them over for largesse, alas.

There was a largesse derby held, so I handed them in despite the fact that there were only two instead of a half dozen. They just take so much longer to make than I'd anticipated. Her Majesty posted this picture of my entry, so that's the only image I have of the blue book!