Recent book finds

I like to go to fleamarkets and every now and then I make nice book finds. I have been wanting to purchase The Forsyte Saga in some form or other, so naturally I just stumbled upon it earlier this week. This set of four books in pristine condition cost me a couple of euros, it's a Finnish translation but that doesn't bother me. Finds like these make perfect practice pieces for leather bindings, but because the books are so neat and surprisingly nice looking I might even leave them the way they are now. All right, let's admit it - I did immediately have this brilliant vision of turning them into a set of four quarter bindings which, when shelved together, would form a gigantic hand tooled head of Soames or something. I struggle to prevent myself from doing it.

I also found a copy of Friday's Child by Georgette Heyer. I find myself fascinated by all the sartorialism and tea drinking this book seems to advocate. However, in a couple of months or so it will probably turn in to several little book necklaces, or dismantle itself for random collage pieces that will travel to all the corners of the world. So.. so, that's all!

Printing blocks and Brontës

This is me getting excited in Haworth, West Yorkshire in 2009. We found a small antiquarian bookshop which stored these drawers full of various wooden printing blocks. The shopkeeper informed us that the blocks used to belong to some printer who quit and just got rid of them. They were all priced separately like collectibles so trying to choose a proper set to buy hurt my brain. Anyway, for a bit of this and that and a small but interesting selection of rare editions see Venables and Bainbridge at 111 Main Street, Haworth. I have yet to use the blocks for anything...

Apart from the odd shops, Haworth is also a nice place to go for a literary pilgrimage. The small village is famous for the Brontë sisters who lived in the old parsonage, now converted into a museum. If you travel outside the tourist season, or if it happens to be a rainy day, there are lots of things to experience. We slept all our nights in our campervan, in a disused gravel parking lot just behind the graveyard; It wouldn't be exaggerated to say that with its tall headstones and slabs the crowded parsonage graveyard feels like the heart of the old village. That and the church, the old stone cottages, narrow alleys, the three pubs - all crammed into this small area, a microcosm of sorts. Behind the parsonage, a small pasture; Behind the pasture, the Pennine moorland.

Ink and other

When it comes to the process of drawing itself, I have never been very picky. For some reason I have come to think that one should be able to do good work regardless of the tools and media used; My collection of drawing and painting equipment probably reflects this stubborn world view. I only want the tools to be pleasant and practical, which means that I like to use all sorts of rubbish like children's felt-tip pens. My excuse is that they are cheap and blend beautifully with water! Because I draw mostly just to amuse myself and place more value on the process, I don't care about whether my drawings exist nice and bright after I'm long gone. Then again, this doesn't mean I'm completely ignorant of what I draw with:


The picture above shows the few tools I use the most, excluding a bigger round brush which is my universal acrylic and ink brush. I use lots of Indian ink which I keep in the glass inkwell pictured. I found the well from a swap meet: First bought the empty well and then found the funny metal-topped cork from a table nearby. I love finds like this. My inkwell is full of old metal nibs which have detached themselves from various ink pens. Naturally, it would be way too cumbersome to empty the bottle once in a while and save the nibs.. wouldn't it?

My favourite pen is a dip pen: I like dip pens because they're nice to use and also much more versatile than ballpoint pens or standard fineliners. In a way they're everlasting, too.. I only use wooden handles because many years ago I accidentally bought a set of them from a fleamarket, immediately falling in love. Before finding these old handles I had used the popular calligraphy handles that come with a metal gripper (the rose shaped opening in which you are supposed to attach the nib). The metal gripper is downright annoying and nothing else: I still have a couple of those handles which I from time to time try to use and always end up dropping or losing the nib somewhere. The vintage wooden handles are extraordinary, even though the thinnest ones sometimes split a bit and need some repair with a masking tape. Gentle loving!