ATG: Seasons

Since last September I have been attending an Art Textile Group at Littleheath Barn run by Liske Johnson.  The theme for the work we were doing was the Seasons.

As you may know I love making books and I love doing collages, so here was the opportunity to combine the two.  We started the sessions working on Summer but having finished the work I have decided to join the book so that it starts with Winter.

The Front Cover
The book is approximately 7" x 6"

For each season I made 3 collages.  At one point each season could have become a panel rather than a zigzag book.

Winter

Spring

Summer

Autumn

The Back Cover

During our time together we tried out various techniques on fabric, the results of which sometimes were included in the book and some pieces have added to my ever-increasing stash.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice

Another Textile Book

I really like the finished bird textile book so I thought I would make another one.  I didn't think the first one was particularly mixed media so I wanted to see if I could add more.

And of course I need a theme for the book.  Can you guess what it is!

 Well, of course it's Venice.   What else would it be!!!

I started by laying out bits of fabric, paper, painted Bondaweb and book page on the calico.

Eventually it ended up like this.

I machine stitched the bottom third of the fabric but forgot to take photo.  I did some handstitching on it at our Traverse weekend.

The next step was to machine again and this is what met me when I went into the craft room aka the dining room.

I was able to put sufficient away to be able to get the machine out.  Who am I kidding?  Nothing got put away, I just moved piles of stuff to make piles of stuff somewhere else!

 I machined around the bits of fabric I had bondawebbed on and then machined the spaces.

Sorry the photos aren't very clear when I'm trying to get the whole book in.  Here's a close up.

Instead of finishing the book with the turned in edges as last time, I left the frayed edges when I added the back.  Then I folded it and pin tucked the fold to make a zigzag book.

Here it is again showing the folds.

I still don't think it's sufficiently mixed media to be called a mixed media book.  I'm going to give some more thought and maybe make another one with beads and bits of metal.  And maybe some stencilling.   What do you think?

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice

Mixed Media Textile Book

I went to the Willow Gallery in Oswestry to do a workshop with Suzette Smart.  As ever I ignored some of the instructions, although I did follow the basic ones.  Suzette's style is to do a lot of mark making with the sewing machine.   I may try that some other time but for now I am really pleased with the simplified version that I made.

We were asked to paint some Bondaweb and for Suzette's technique you paint trees or birds or other images onto the Bondaweb.  I just coloured it with two colours of paint across the whole piece!  When it was dry I cut out teardrop shapes.  I also ironed some Bondaweb onto a book page and tore the page into little strips.

Rather than machine stitch certain areas I stitched across the whole thing with variegated thread.

 Then I machined some tail feathers.

I added beaks, wings and legs.

I stitched the back on and pintucked the pages to make a zigzag book.  The edge at each end was pinned as I wanted to add some fabric - but that was at home!

At home I machine stitched the piece of fabric inside the open edge to close it up at both ends.

The finished book.

I don't usually do 'cute' but I really love this little book.

Thanks for joining me today.
Bernice