Sewing Colleen’s Garden Themed Journal – Caterpillar Stitch

Posted on by Ruth under Books, Things I've Made

Another great commission from a local library, this time to create a garden themed journal for their Head of Patron Services, Colleen, who is retiring after 37 years at the library! I’ve done other commissioned works for their employees in the past, including a neat retirement album and an awesome travel journal.

Enjoy! More details below on paper types. Feel free to go nuts and pin stuff to pinterest 🙂 (While you’re at it you can check out my Handmade Books and Journals Pinterest board too!

Handmade Journal for Colleen - Caterpillar Stitch Binding by Ruth Bleakley

Burnishing the Cover - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

Finished cover with no holes - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

Finished cover with holes pierced - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

Detail of holes for Caterpillar binding - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

This is the secret for sewing a straight coptic stitch binding - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

Sewing the cover onto the book with linen thread - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

Finished Caterpillar - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

Handmade Caterpillar Stitch Journal by Ruth Bleakley

Cork paper end pages - handmade caterpillar stitch book by Ruth Bleakley

Finished Journal - The making of a Caterpillar Stitch Book by Ruth Bleakley

The idea was that Colleen loves to garden, so I wanted to create a book that used lots of lovely textured natural papers

from top to bottom using the photo above, here are the papers I used:

  • Brown with fibers – banana leaf paper from Thailand
  • Thin white stripe – yuzen from Japan
  • Green with silver stamp – Lokta from Nepal
  • Leaf paper – yes, real leaves! kozo paper from Thailand
  • white stripe on the spine – yuzen paper from Japan
  • dark green leaves – Lokta paper from Nepal
  • Endpapers (not shown, inside book) cork paper from Portugal

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About the Author

Ruth

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10 Comments

Carol Creech

Fantastic!!! What a beautiful gift and the way you created the theme and used the caterpillar stitch worked so well with this. Love seeing the process.

Carol

Reply
Ruth

Thanks Carol! Yes, when I heard “garden journal” I thought “I gotta try the caterpillar stitch on it!”

Reply
Colleen

Hi Ruth, I finally noticed this comment section when I went back to look at your web page. This book is so wonderful! I absolutely love it!! Thanks

Reply
Linda

i still don’t understand the leap between the legs and then the transition to the body. What on earth am I missing? I love this and am so compelled to figure it out!!! Many thanks, Linda

Reply

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