New in the Shop: Trinket Box featuring Liberty London Fabric

I have a new box in the shop and it started out as most of my "for fun" projects do. I sat down with all of my favorite things and started playing. In this case, that button and those charms found their way to each other and I paired them with Liberty London's Fairford pattern for a happy little match.

Here's what happened next! Click on the photo to see a larger version in a new window.

Custom Folding Trinket Boxes

Upon our return from France, my bags were a tad heavier with the weight of souvenirs and trinkets. Among my favorite were beautiful silky cotton prints by Liberty of London. My friend Camille introduced me to the fabric and the Liberty craze that seemed to have taken over all of the shops in Paris. 

I didn't have a specific plan for these treasures, but they just had to come home with me! I spread all of the fabric out for my family this summer and one of my aunts had the idea to have me use some of it to make something for her and my cousins for Christmas. These photos are of the boxes that were under their tree on Christmas morning. The box above uses Liberty's Small Susanna print.

I sent thumbnails of all of my fabric to my aunt and she asked my cousins to pick their favorites, without giving them a reason why. This was a top-secret project! This Liberty print, Mauvey, is the first that caught my eye. I bought a metre of it at the most fabulous store, Merci, also introduced to me by Camille and her friend Cynthia.

This sweet floral print was a JoAnn's find.

For the guy in the brood, Liberty's Pelagia print gave a bit of a masculine touch.

 

I found this print of the Tuileries Gardens at Hearbeat Quilts in Barnstable, MA. You can just see a few details in this shot, but I have a couple of yards of it, so I imagine it'll make its way into a quilt (and more photos) this year.

These boxes were based on a trinket box that I made for my dad to give to my mom a while back, and now that I've gotten back into the groove of making them, I'm thinking I'll have to make a lot more!

Mission Accomplished: Guest Books & Exciting News

Voila! Three earth friendly looking guest books! I've obscured the logos on the front covers, but otherwise, that's just what they look like. I finished them on Friday morning, so I had plenty of time to turn them in before their afternoon deadline.

Ollie kept me company, and thankfully a squirrel kept him entertained, so he wasn't chasing paper around the bindery!

Here is a shot of what I use for my job backer (the contraption that holds the text block in place while the shoulders are formed). Gilding boards with binders board support strips are set securely into a lying press. I use a jewelers hammer and a fender hammer for rounding.

It had been a while since I'd sewn an endband, and it was fun to get to do six of them!

 Now for the biggest news of all! On Wednesday Josh and I found out that we'll be relocating to Paris for 3 months! He leaves on Friday and I'll join him the first week of April after I finish up projects in the bindery. It's just now sinking in that this is really happening. I didn't have time to think about it while I was working on the guest books, so it's been a great weekend just daydreaming about all of the things we'll get to see and do in the next couple of months. Me-oh-my!