here’s the bare bones of the spirit book I am binding of Susan Kapuscinski Gaylord’s Spirit Book Series
tendrils will start growing out of the edges of the covers, back of the spine & inside the pages
the pages will be embellished with drawings, stitching & beading in response to each of Susan’s Spirit Books
and lots more wrapping, weaving and beading into the jute cords to integrate all the materials inside and out
here’s the text block ready to have the covers tied in
the holes are made with an awl
the inside of the covers in process
sewing the stations with nettle string showing a weaver’s knot for joining in a new piece of string
a paper sewing pattern opened to the centre for each of the signatures
this handmade French watercolour paper is thick & lush but needed reinforcing with bookbinders mull pasted onto the spine & into the centre of each signature
The sketches are starting for the next crow drawing, “One night when sleep wouldn’t come” focusing on these lines-
“he said, “The spirits like to see us dance on the shifting sands of change,
keeping just one step ahead of the game”
what we’re talking about can’t be taught, can’t be sold, can’t be bought
is real as shadows on a wall, comes like pride before a fall
you can’t put it in your pocket and store it away, save it for a rainy day”
(song words © Rod Morgan 2007)
I love this song so much, it deepens the spirit for this book and the stitching will take it further in with all the cloth conjurors over at Jude Hill’s What If Diaries
It's Crow Time 
So Earthy and wonderful… perfect for Susan’s book!!
it’s so good to be bookbinding again V!
I bet you needed that lump of wax! 🙂
indeedy!
what a wondrous book this will be! I haven’t seen nettle string before. Is it “sticky” to bind with? Love how it looks.
thanks for the good words! that nettle string is both gnarly & fragile so it broke quite often while stitching
This is one of those rare occasions when it would be safe to say–“Do. Definitely do judge this book by it’s cover.”
Magic is alive.
it’s a good way to explore & honour Susan’s fabulous body of work.
soooo impressed…body and soul will be within this book – a window on the world…just wonderful…
Mo, it’s utterly gorgeous! Truly a magical book, it belongs on Prospero’s shelves, I’m sure!
thanks for popping in Christina, it’s a start!
hi Mo, loving the way the string is traveling across the cover, absolutely luscious.
it was your encouraging words on Friday that got it moving!
Looking scrumptious Mo. ox
feels kind of funny to be working with such a rough earthy looking thing when the side project for this year was to explore the nuances of Black & White in relationship to lace!
So this is the side project of the side project and the good thing is it relates to the spirit in the next crow drawing which is coming along with the crow hitching in the rain with his guitar in a sack under a pale street light with shadows cast on the wall outside a bleak warehouse (see TS Eliot’s Prelude below for atmosphere ) as the white lines of the road wind out over the hills and far way to the wheeling & dancing spirit crows up in the starlit sky ….
Winter is a good time for us as the gardening slows down giving more time to indulge in all the little side projects that come up… like the tendency in this quote from Tom Phillips “A Humament” – “sidelines shift towards towards the centre”
Preludes
By T. S. Eliot
I
The winter evening settles down
With smell of steaks in passageways.
Six o’clock.
The burnt-out ends of smoky days.
And now a gusty shower wraps
The grimy scraps
Of withered leaves about your feet
And newspapers from vacant lots;
The showers beat
On broken blinds and chimney-pots,
And at the corner of the street
A lonely cab-horse steams and stamps.
And then the lighting of the lamps.
II
The morning comes to consciousness
Of faint stale smells of beer
From the sawdust-trampled street
With all its muddy feet that press
To early coffee-stands.
With the other masquerades
That time resumes,
One thinks of all the hands
That are raising dingy shades
In a thousand furnished rooms.
III
You tossed a blanket from the bed,
You lay upon your back, and waited;
You dozed, and watched the night revealing
The thousand sordid images
Of which your soul was constituted;
They flickered against the ceiling.
And when all the world came back
And the light crept up between the shutters
And you heard the sparrows in the gutters,
You had such a vision of the street
As the street hardly understands;
Sitting along the bed’s edge, where
You curled the papers from your hair,
Or clasped the yellow soles of feet
In the palms of both soiled hands.
IV
His soul stretched tight across the skies
That fade behind a city block,
Or trampled by insistent feet
At four and five and six o’clock;
And short square fingers stuffing pipes,
And evening newspapers, and eyes
Assured of certain certainties,
The conscience of a blackened street
Impatient to assume the world.
I am moved by fancies that are curled
Around these images, and cling:
The notion of some infinitely gentle
Infinitely suffering thing.
Wipe your hand across your mouth, and laugh;
The worlds revolve like ancient women
Gathering fuel in vacant lots.
Beautiful words, as are Rod’s “One night when sleep wouldn’t come” and yes very atmospheric. Really looking forward to your next drawing
PS my favourite words in Rod’s song , is the last verse. ox
thanks Marg! when I spoke to Old Man Crow this morning about this spirit book being a diversion from the lace as this year’s sideline he said, “There’s still a connection with lace in using the distressed cloth on the covers because lace is just cloth with holes in it.” love that thought!
Hee,Hee. ox
A truly stunning book on the way there Mo, I am so looking forward to watching it unfold over winter. So much to take in here, both in your post and in the comments. T.S. Eliot’s poem is beautiful, I hadn’t read it before. Thank you.
I hadn’t read that poem since I studied it in high school, it’s etched deep in my soul along with The Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock and I do “wear my trousers” rolled these days!
Susan has just posted about this project on her blog for her Book Arts Tuesday, this is such a buzz!
this is excellent, and what an honor for susan. well done!
thanks for visiting Velma I love what you are doing with your shifu books!