Traveler Journals 3

Following the final steps towards finishing the book covers and staining, folding, and piercing the pages came the addition of Some string here and there...But first! adding the inside lining to all the covers...Most of these pieces came out with a nice wavy-ish variations in color which, in my opinion, looked alright!

 So I proceeded to cut down these pieces to fit according to their covers as seen below...these were then glued down using slightly diluted white glue...

 Before going i went back and pierced the cover's holes with a needle tool since the gesso and paint had seeped into them a bit...Next i dyed a ball of thick cotton string (will get a closeup in a future post). As with a previous project i just went with a dye mix composed of coffee first and then added random spots of diluted black acrylic to the string to create a variation in tones...Once i had this i went on to thread it in whichever way i wanted!

As i was working with these guys i made sure that the string i was threading into the covers was longer than what was needed since i wasn't sure at this point on what i would use the extra string...something in between a bookmarker or some kind of book closing method...

 After this was done it was time to prepare for the sowing of the books...For this i went with using some cotton yarn i found at the store.

 Once again just as with the string used for the covers i used a combination of diluted coffee and acrylics. I went on to add the dye using a paint blush and letting it soak in...I let it bask in the lovely 100 degree exterior for and hour and it was ready to use!

 Separated the magazines into their bundles of 10, making sure that the holes at the spines aligned well...

 And finally got to the fun part of learning how to do a coptic stitch, which turned out to be a pretty easy and fun task! This is the youtube tutorial i learned it from: Coptic Stitch Tutorial

 Et c'est tout! First coptic stitched book done!