Books and Bindings

27/04/2024

Looking for something to do tomorrow? Come to see us in the One Craft Gallery, Shepton Mallet - we're open for the Shepton Mallet Sunday Market!

We’re excited to be open for the market this Sunday! Very much hoping the weather will be kind for us and all the people who have put in so much effort to make Shepton Mallet’s Sunday M…

23/02/2024

I’ve spent many enjoyable hours this month working on a laced on binding for my City &Guilds diploma with . I’m covering a copy of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. Most nerve wracking was the edge painting, but I’m quite pleased with the results. Many hours still to go, and hopefully the final result will be worth sharing, and submitting!

13/02/2024

It's Shepton Mallet's Snowdrop Festival this week, so drop in to see us at One Craft Gallery! I'm there on Thursday, so do pop in and say hello. This is our beautiful window, courtesy of Pen and Jen!

Shepton is all things snowdrop this week, so we’ve even more snowdrop-themed goodies in the One Craft Gallery! Don’t forget to look at our window and take a few more steps inside while …

01/02/2024

Absolutely lovely to have my regular little bookbinding group back for a session making half bound books with a ribbon closure. Lots of chatter and laughs and yet everyone still produced beautiful books!

22/01/2024

For this month’s meetup of we decided to depart from the AreYouBookEnough theme. February sees the annual Snowdrop Festival in Shepton Mallet, celebrating the renowned horticulturalist James Allen, who was the first person to breed new varieties from wild snowdrops. My contribution was a concertina pocket book, with 6 photos of Shepton with a swathe of snowdrops running along the bottom pockets. Tucked into each pocket is a different
variety of snowdrop. On the back is some information about each photo. I learnt a lot as I did it - the history of Shepton prison is fascinating!

06/01/2024

Oops! Can’t believe I didn’t post December’s challenge till now. It’s even the wrong year! Blame a hectic (tho lovely) Christmas. Anyway, as my contribution for Lapis Lazuli, I wrote a poem, tho hardly worthy if the description, but the title ‘Why feel blue when you can feel Lapis Lazuli’ stuck with me once I’d thought of it. Each line is placed on an appropriately toned blue sheet and folded into a Hungarian map fold, then glued together waterlily style. It’s even written in Lapis Lazuli ink… I just wish my writing was neater!

12/12/2023

Just getting things together and remembering why I don’t often do craft fairs! However, tomorrow I will be at the Christmas Craft Market in Wells Town Hall. It runs from 9 - 3.00, so if you’re in Wells, do pop in and say hello. As well as selling a range of books, I’m selling vouchers for my bookbinding workshops. I love to give activities as presents, so I’m hoping others feel the same! I will also have a sale tray for anyone who likes a bargain!! 😁📚

10/12/2023

Spent such an enjoyable day yesterday, showing 3 of my lovely regular workshop ladies how to make my take on a star book. They were so creative with their ideas, and their books turned out beautifully. The only person not to finish was me! So, I’ve added pictures of my ‘through the windows’ book at the end.

28/11/2023

A busy weekend taking 3 workshops! A lovely couple from Sweden through Airbnb Experiences who made wraparound leather notebooks, two of my regulars who came for a festive special to make pocket concertina advent calendars and a fellow .sheptonmallet gallery member who wanted to make a photo album! All did brilliantly, and I thoroughly enjoyed it, but I feel I need a holiday - good thing I’m going to stay with my daughter in York tomorrow!

19/11/2023

Results of another lovely day in the Daffodil Barn learning the basics of edge decoration with Kate Holland as part of my City & Guilds Diploma with . Looking forward to practising more at home!

12/11/2023

Ran a workshop for 4 lovely ladies who were staying in Bath to celebrate a significant birthday. It’s the first time I’ve taken a workshop to someone else’s’ house, and it worked really well! All their books turned out really well, and much fun was had! All booked through Airbnb Experiences.

05/11/2023

Very pleased to have completed the Laced on Leather Binding course with Shepherds Bookbinders in the Daffodil Barn. I thought I wasn’t going to manage it as floods meant I couldn’t get there on day one! However, many thanks to tutor Angela Sutton who prepped my text block and made my endpapers, I was able to catch up over the other 3 days. And for people who think 4 days is a long time to make just one book, I’ve compiled a photo showing just some of the many stages involved! Fabulous course as always!