Frances Pickering - A Special Place

Last week my daughter and I attended a four day workshop run by Frances Pickering at Art Van Go. We first saw her beautiful books at Alexandra Palace in 2009. Examples of her work can be seen on her website which is well worth a visit. If you haven't met her or seen her work she will be at the Knitting and Stitching Show again this year.

The title of the workshop was 'A Special Place' and I decided to use my allotment as my inspiration.

Here you can see Frances Pickering (with the red hair) and some of the class

We were going to make little books out of fabric, painted and stitched. The first thing to do was to use thinned gesso (which could be coloured) and rub it into the fabric with a spoon. We then had to thoroughly dry it, this was time consuming and rather boring but essential. Page size strips were then torn which makes a lovely noise.

The first thing to make was the cover. You can see two stages of the cover and the lining.

We then inserted the pages and started decorating them.

It is very easy to draw and paint on the stiffened fabric. The pages now need stitching and finishing off. I am planning on taking the book with me on my travels. I may even make some more.

Here are some of Frances Pickering's books. They are all quite small and fit easily into your hand.

Here are some pages from some of her sketchbooks. You can see how essential it is to try out your ideas before you commit them to your final book.

Here are the books made by everyone in the class.

I asked everyone if I could take a photograph of each of the books. I let them choose which page to photograph.