Wednesday Worktable, December 12th : More Leather!

I'm joining in with WOYWW at Julia's Stamping Ground. Go and see what everyone else has been making (well, after you read my post, eh?)

I'm having a burst of successful sales, in my Etsy and Folksy shops!  This week I took three packages to the PO on Monday, three more on Tuesday and there are four waiting to go tomorrow (Thursday), as the PO was closed this afternoon. 
It seems that I should go out often too, as that appears to be when the customers sneak in and buy stuff!  Imagine, I can be a shopkeeper and make sales, without actually having to be on the premises! 

And this...

...was whisked off its (virtual and actual) shelf within half an hour of listing it... by a Person we all know well (but I won't divulge who that is, as they may not want me to!).  

Still, it's always lovely to have something bought by an online friend - it kind of gives you the "warm fuzzies" to think someone you know appreciates your work (even after getting all the gory details on my blog!). 

So the red leather chapbook is winging its way across the miles, to an undisclosed destination, to be a Christmas Gift for someone nice. 

Which makes me smile.

 

And I also sold a second leather journal:

This black leather and mulberry suede journal sold yesterday.

It's filled with a whole rainbow of paper!

 

 

The "thing for red" has given way to a "thing for leather" now!  I made three more chapbooks and a mini journal, which I have listed for sale today.  Wish me luck!

Another journal, from the same black leather piece.  I bought a large piece of Italian upholstery quality leather and I love it!

I used a rather gorgeous glass bead as the fastening.  It's black glass, with a green and aqua dichroic section in the middle.  I used teal suede strips to fix the bead to the front cover and as a tie to fasten it, attached to the back cover...

 

...and I used green Austrian linen thread for binding, to pick up the green in the bead.

It has 48 pages of that gorgeous cream laid text paper that I've recently acquired; I have lots and lots of it and I'm quite excited, as it's possibly the best text paper I've ever been able to buy - paper being expensive, especially if you buy it in packs of 500 full-size sheets (almost A1 size - around 30"x20", or around 80x55cm - that's pretty big!)

 

Then I made a second deep red chapbook.  This one has a strip of black leather, as decoration and for fastening, with another of those lovely metal Celtic Knots.

I used black waxed linen cord for binding..

The black leather is also on the back cover; it tucks through at the outside edge, so it can be wrapped over to the front and round the metal button.  (Don't you think that the leather strip looks a bit like a belt?)

I stitched the metal embellishment on, to keep the black leather strip in place on the front and to create space for the fastening tie strip to tuck beneath it.  It looks a bit untidy in the photo, but in real life it looks fine.  Who said that cameras never lie, eh?

 

This book is also filled with crisp, cream laid text paper.  Lovely!

 

The last of the chapbooks is my favourite.  This is made from the most gorgeous piece of Robins Egg Blue lamb leather.  It is amazingly soft and supple.  A bit thinner than the Italian calf leathers of the red and black books, but still nice for a limp leather binding. 

Because it's such lovely leather, I kept the overall thing quite simple - this is the back.

I attached a long glass bead to the front, as a fastening and plaited up some deep turquoise linen thread, to make cord for attaching the bead and wrapping round from the back cover, to close the book.  

I used the same deep turquoise linen to bind the book...

...and filled it with my favourite cream paper!

 

That's my little set of leather chapbooks. 

 

I also made this...

...or rather, I completed this little book, which I posted about the other day.  It was made up to this point...

...and I made a leather wrap-round fastening for it.

Now it closes neatly, with the leather strip wrapping right round and tucking under at the front.

I love this saffron coloured linen for the binding!

I think it looks quite smart like this.  

Of course, it's only a little book - just 3.5 inches high. 

But it still has 40 pages of great paper inside and I love it to bits!

 

I still have itchy fingers, to make more journals - watch this space!

 

And on another subject, I should be posting soon about James' new sports interest...  when the photos are ready!

 

Thanks for reading!