Easy as 1, 2, 3

Another DIY Christmas gift has been fulfilled...

Part 1:
Co-worker Erin gave us a wonderful gift for Christmas. Large scans of the covering paper of Violet Oakley's sketchbooks.

This last pattern comes from this sketch book:

 Where the actual sketchbook comes from, we have no idea. Ms. Oakley purchased sketchbooks worldwide.
Just to be sure you appreciate Ms. Oakley's talent, images from this particular sketch book:

Just who is Violet Oakley? Her wikipedia page can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violet_Oakley although it does not do her justice. Ms. Oakley was the first woman to receive public mural commission in the US - ca. 1911.  The murals still exist on the Pennsylvania State House walls. But she accomplished many other projects as well, more than I can enumerate in this post. My place of employment cares for more than 100 of her sketch books. Her paintings can be found in prominent institutions such as the Philadelphia Museum of Art as well as PAFA (Philadelphia Academy of Fine Art, where she both studied and taught - take your pick of articles in the link). But sadly, she has has been forgotten as one of the great American Artists. Even though she deserves a seat next to artists such as Mary Cassatt, who also had Philadelphia connections.
My place of employment hired Erin to rehouse the collection and perform minor conservation treatments as needed. Erin did an admirable job and now all of Ms. Oakley's sketchbooks as well as other drawings and her artists books are available for research.

Part 2:
Last Spring I had an "intern". I say "intern" because she didn't fulfill the hours needed to fulfill an internship - but not for lack of trying. It was unpaid and she had a concurrent paid position and being a reasonable person I absolutely understand that when push comes to shove, a student has to go with the paid position! In the end the karma bank paid me a dividend. The intern told me of something she was doing in the paid position I'd never heard of...printing patterns with inkjet directly onto book cloth! I. could. not. believe. it. How simple!
Of course - I had to try it.

Part 3: how the first two come together. 
I used Erin's wonderful gift to print a piece of book cloth.

 

The perfect project for the cloth took a while to materialize. Then, I had to teach a specific binding to interns and this was the perfect covering material. They liked it as well so I printed more at work on the brown cloth. 

 

We love the spines. 

 

 Anybody need a writing journal?