As I stand here cutting paper and sewing books for KUKI I’m reminded of the last time I was preparing for the KUKI festival which was three years ago I think. I cannot believe the change in just a few years in my approach to making these notebooks. Looking at some of the books I made back then, frankly I’m embarrassed. My slap-dash way of measuring and cutting was shocking! In fact I’ll go as far as to say it wasn’t in my nature to quibble over the millimetres. I would even suggest to the participants at my workshops to ‘wing it’ most of the time and I’d mock anyone who spent longer than a couple of seconds calculating exactly how many millimetres to measure with their sharp HB pencil. After making accordion books and discovering the need to have deadly accuracy if you want the pages to look perfect and the covers to open properly, I find myself measuring twice before cutting just to make sure and testing paper grain. All alien concepts in my past life.
I’ve even marked on my cutter the mm difference because I’ve discovered not all rulers are the same.
I can tell you right here and now that my HB pencil is sharp, my cutting blade is regularly changed and my metal ruler is always on the table. There’ll be no slacking with these books.
I’ll crack on sewing until I have a nice little stack.
Have a good weekend and I’ll see you here next week.
Jaine xx
