Book Review: Creative Marker Art & Beyond

I'm finishing my Book Week with a lovely crafty book: Creative Marker Art and Beyond: inspiring tips, techniques, and projects for creating vibrant artwork in marker, by Lee Foster-Wilson of Bonbi Forest.

 

A couple of years ago Lee took part in the 100 Day Project, setting herself the challenge of doing a marker pen drawing a day, picking the pens at random to force herself to try new colour combinations and make the most of her pen stash.

During the project she learned loads about working with markers and totally fell in love with them as a medium... and now she's written a book to share her top tips and get us all inspired to get doodling.

 

The book starts with a quick introduction to the different types of marker pens available (permanent markers, paint markers, metallic markers, brush markers, and more), the basics of colour theory and some useful drawing techniques like crosshatching and stippling.

The rest of the book is made up of Creativity Prompts (e.g. drawing from nature), Marker Exercises (e.g. simplifying your sketches to create stylised motifs), and Step-by-Step Projects (e.g. decorating rocks with your drawings). This mix makes the book part creative workbook with ideas to spark your creativity and blank pages for you to get doodling straight away, and part how-to guide with projects that you can either recreate or use as inspiration for your own makes.

 

There are ten sections in the book, each with a creativity prompt, marker exercise and step-by-step project - some loosely connected, some directly following on from each other (for example, in one section you try hand lettering, then try out ideas for embellished lettering, then decorate a notebook using lettering to create a personalised design).

As you work through the book you'll learn lots of different ways to use markers, including some fab ideas for using markers which are drying out and starting to fade (which you'd normally just throw away). The project ideas are also all lovely, and are great examples of the versatility of markers and the many different surfaces you can decorate them.

 

I would have liked a bit more detail in some of the step-by-step tutorials, as there are a couple of points where the instructions are not as clear as they could be. For example, there's a fabric banner project where you need "primed fabric in a banner shape of your choice" but it's not explained how you're supposed to "prime" your fabric, or with what.

I also would have loved a section with patterns and motifs to trace, so we could recreate the projects show in the book exactly - because they're a lot nicer than most of my doodles!

It's also worth noting that to make the projects in the book you will need quite a wide range of different markers (standard permanent markers, fine liners for detail, brush markers for layering colours, and paint markers for drawing on glass and rocks) as the different types of pens write on different surfaces and behave in different ways. You could use a lot of the drawing techniques to get doodling with a basic pack of markers, but many of the cool project ideas do require fancier pens.

I think you would almost definitely want to buy more pens after buying this book, though! Lee's enthusiasm for markers is pretty infectious and she's done a great job of showing how versatile they can be, and how many lovely things you can draw and make with them.

If you want a detailed book of drawing techniques, or a book with patterns where you can make the exact project shown in the book then this is not the book for you. However, if you've got a neglected pack of markers in a drawer somewhere (or you've always been tempted by those big packs of different colours you get in stationery shops but never knew what do with them) and want to flex your creative muscles a bit and get doodling, then this book could be the start of your very own love affair with marker art.

Creative Marker Art and Beyond: inspiring tips, techniques, and projects for creating vibrant artwork in marker is published by Walter Foster Publishing. It's available from Amazon UK, Amazon USA, The Book Depository and many other websites and bookshops.

I received a free review copy of this book from the publishers. Please note that the Amazon and Book Depository links in this blog post are affiliate links, which means if you click through and make a purchase I get a tiny percentage for the referral. It doesn't cost you anything and it helps support my blog.

P.S. The Mandalas to Embroider giveaway ends on 10th May, have you entered yet?

P.P.S. Visit my book reviews archive for a look at lots more crafty books!

Book Review: Craft a Life You Love

My Book Week continues today with a look at Craft a Life You Love: infusing creativity, fun & intention into your everyday by Amy Tan, aka Amy Tangerine.

Amy self-published Craft a Life You Love last year, and this revised and expanded edition has now been published by Abrams Books. This isn't a "how to" craft book or a "grow your creative business!" book, but is instead essentially a self-help book for people with creative hobbies.

It's about how to find the time and motivation to fit more creative projects into your schedule, and how crafting and creativity can enrich our lives and make us happier. Beyond this, Amy (who seems like an incredibly upbeat, positive person) explores ways in which we can take control of our lives to create "a life you love": being more positive, learning to love ourselves (with all our quirks), and focusing on our priorities and goals.

 

The book is divided into six themed chapters with titles like "Crafting the Soul" and "Crafting Happiness through Habits", then sub-divided into 28 smaller sections. Each section begins with a memoir-like story from Amy's life showing something she's learned, or how she makes use of a certain habit or attitude in her everyday life, and ends with an exercise for you to follow to put the ideas from that section into action.

Most of the exercises involve written prompts for you to think about and respond to, with space for you to write down your responses. For example, there are pages to fill out tracking your daily tasks and how happy they make you, an exercise in rewriting negative thoughts into positive ones, and a list of prompts like "who is someone who gives me tremendous energy and why?" and "what does a perfect day look like?" to get you started on a daily journalling habit.

 

Early on in the book there's also a "permission slip" to sign (to give yourself permission to take time for your hobby to feed your soul) - Amy really believes in the power of writing stuff down!

Because of the workbook-like nature of this book, I'm not sure if this book would be great value if you're not the sort of person who is actually going to sit down and do the exercises suggested. Reading the book from cover-to-cover (which I did, for this review) without following any of the prompts doesn't take that long and you, naturally, skip a lot of blank pages along the way.

 

There's some good, practical advice in here, but some of the stuff about "synchronicity" between Amy and the "naturally benevolent" Universe made me raise my eyebrows and make little frowny faces while reading, and there are a few all-caps comments in my notes like "THIS IS NOT A SIGN FROM THE UNIVERSE, IT'S JUST A COINCIDENCE!!!". I am honestly not sure that I have ever read a self-help book in my entire life that didn't cause me to have a few raised-eyebrow moments, though! I am quite cynical at heart (or maybe just British???) and I think I just reach a tipping point where the self-help speak gets a bit much and my internal commentary goes a bit shouty.

At the end of the day, this stuff doesn't make the good advice less good, or the practical tips less useful. Craft a Life You Love might have given me a few shouty all-caps moments, but I also wrote a whole bunch of positive notes while reading and have been thinking a lot about some of the advice in the book.

Overall, I think this would be a great book to work through if you have trouble with confidence (not just creative confidence) and struggle to carve out time for your creative hobbies or other things in your life that bring you joy. I'd also recommend it to people who are feeling a bit "stuck" in their lives and daily routines: you don't have to keep feeling that way, and Craft a Life You Love has a lot of simple but useful tips for making small changes in your thinking and your habits to help you live your best life.

Craft a Life You Love: infusing creativity, fun & intention into your everyday is published by Abrams books. It's available from Amazon UK, Amazon USA, The Book Depository and many other websites and bookshops.

I received a free review copy of this book from the publishers. Please note that the Amazon and Book Depository links in this blog post are affiliate links, which means if you click through and make a purchase I get a tiny percentage for the referral. It doesn't cost you anything and it helps support my blog.

P.S. Make sure you check out this week's giveaway - click here to read my review of Mandalas to Embroider, and for your chance to win a copy!

Visit my book reviews archive for a look at lots more crafty books! 

Book Review & Giveaway: Mandalas to Embroider

As promised, this week is Book Week!

The first book I'm looking at is the very lovely Mandalas to Embroider: Kaleidoscope Stitching in a Hoop, by Carina Envoldsen-Harris of Polka & Bloom.

It can be a teeny bit awkward when a friend asks you to review their book - I mean, what if you don't like it? What if you think it's rubbish??? I didn't have to worry at all about reviewing this book, though, as I knew Carina was going to knock it out of the park.

Mandalas to Embroider contains 24 meditative, mandala-inspired embroidery designs. As well as being nice to look at, the idea is that you can lose yourself in the relaxing process of stitching the pretty, geometric designs.

There are 12 large designs (sized to fit perfectly in 6 inch embroidery hoops) and 12 small designs, which you can use as decorative motifs on other sewing projects or frame in mini Dandelyne hoops (if you've not heard of these, they're fab mini embroidery-hoop style frames perfect for making embroidered necklaces and other jewellery).

At the start of the book you'll find comprehensive guides to the tools and stitches you'll need to complete the designs in the book, as well as tips on working with embroidery hoops.

Each project is shown fully stitched in Carina's bright and cheerful colour palettes, with a full-colour version of the pattern and a list of suggested DMC embroidery thread colours so you can replicate the design exactly if you want.

Aren't they fabulous?

Finally at the back of the book you'll find the patterns themselves. This is one of the things that makes this book so great: these aren't patterns printed on book pages that you'll need to photocopy and tape to a window to trace (though you can do that, of course), they're actually embroidery transfer sheets! You just tear out the page along the perforation and follow the instructions to use an iron to transfer the design to your fabric.

Apparently the sheets can be used up to 10 times, then after that you can photocopy them. There's even a pocket built into the back cover of the book for you to tuck the transfers so you don't lose them, which is very helpful (I am forever forgetting what "safe place" I've put paper patterns in!).

I really love this book, and (gushing friendship moment) I'm really proud of Carina for designing it, she is so talented and her use of colour is always such a joy.

If I'm honest, I'm not sure I'd ever stitch the small designs (I don't wear a lot of jewellery, and I much prefer the intricacy of the larger designs), but the large ones are so nice and the iron-on transfer sheets so easy to use that I think this book would be a great value purchase even if you only wanted to stitch a few of them.

Mandalas to Embroider: Kaleidoscope Stitching in a Hoop, is published by Search Press. It's available from Amazon UK, Amazon USA, The Book Depository and many other websites and bookshops. You can also buy signed copies direct from Carina's website.

Please note that the Amazon and Book Depository links in this blog post are affiliate links, which means if you click through and make a purchase I get a tiny percentage for the referral. It doesn't cost you anything and it helps support my blog. 

Visit my book reviews archive for a look at lots more crafty books! 

The lovely people at Search Press sent me a free copy of this book to review (thanks, guys!) and have another copy for me to give away - hurrah! 

Just leave a comment on this blog post for your chance to win!

Leave your comment before 10pm (UK time) on Thursday 10th May. I'll then contact the winner and pass their info along so the book can be posted to them by the team at Search Press.

Please make sure you leave a blog link, Twitter/Instagram/Etsy username (no locked accounts, please, I need to be able to contact you), or email address in your comment so I can get in touch if you're the winner. This giveaway is open worldwide. Yay!

If I'm unable to contact the winner within a week, I will pick someone else. If you're leaving a comment with your Blogger profile, please remember that you need to have your profile set to public & to have a contact email visible for me to be able to get in touch with you.

UPDATE: this giveaway is now closed. 

Book Review: A World of Quilts

If you follow me on Instagram you'll have seen that I've been putting in lots of hours of work lately on the Christmas quilt I'm sewing for my sister. This seems like a good time to review one of the quilting books that's been on my "to review" pile for a while!

A few years ago I reviewed Quilt Love by Cassandra Ellis and adored it. Her aesthetic isn't my usual taste (I'm a sucker for really bright, bold colours) but Cassandra writes so passionately about quilt making and the joy of making special, meaningful quilts full of character, memories, history and emotion. The book was also really rather beautiful! I pretty much fell in love with it and the whole idea of making a quilt.

So, I was delighted when her publishers (Jacqui Small, who publish so many gorgeous titles) sent me a copy of the follow up - A World of Quilts - to review. Unfortunately they sent it at a time that I was feeling a little overwhelmed by work and it (and a few other titles) has sat on a shelf ever since. Hopefully this review will be worth the wait...

Like Quilt Love, A World of Quilts is a beautiful hardback. This time round the designs are inspired by quilting traditions around the world, with 25 contemporary quilt designs included in the book. The designs are inspired by styles such as Postage Stamp, Rail Fence, Kantha, Wild Goose Chase, Amish Sawtooth, Wholecloth, Utility, String, Welsh Bars, Log Cabin, Pojagi, Irish Chain and many more.

Then there's a "Quilt Masterclass" section, which covers everything from designing your quilt and choosing fabrics to binding the quilt and caring for the finished quilt. I found this section very useful when I came to start the actual quilting part of my Christmas quilt recently, it's filled with lots of helpful tips.

You can, of course, get a quilting how-to from lots of different books - so what makes this book special? For me, it's Cassandra's whole approach to quilting.

She writes in the book's introduction that she realised quilts were "the absolute summation of homes, families, communities and individuals. They were practical and very, very personal, which meant they became completely precious to the individual and family. Quilts represented both the maker's creativity and their family's history. As well as a means to provide warmth, quilts could be the ultimate storytellers."

Her writing is so encouraging and inspiring!

"Find a story and a quilt that moves you. Do not fret over your stitching skills or be anxious about your choice of fabric. Most of all, don't give a moment's thought to whether you feel you are creative. Just make."

She encourages you to work with fabrics that have real meaning to you, including recycling old shirts and dresses, and using luxurious fabrics like silk and velvet to create something really special. I'm so used to seeing quilts made with purpose-designed quilting cottons it makes a nice change seeing something like, for example, a quilt made from vintage saris.

Even the Masterclass section is inspiring. The advice isn't at all prescriptive, instead there's lots of emphasis on doing what works best for you and not worrying too much about small imperfections. "The Japanese have a philosophy of kaizen, which means continuous improvement while being happy with what you have created now - and I love this idea. Just remember, it is the making that is important, not the perfect triangle."

This is basically exactly what I needed to hear as I embarked on hand quilting my sister's quilt - it's being made with so much love, what does it matter if my stitching isn't quite straight and my stitches are a bit wonky?

Each of the 25 designs in the book is introduced with a page about the history of the traditional design or local quilting tradition which inspired it. Together these are like a mini history of quilt making, they're so interesting to read!

Then there's an in-situ photo of the quilt looking lovely and all the practical information needed to make the quilt. The projects are rated by difficulty: "easy", "a little more challenging" and "requires patience and concentration" so you can see which ones you feel up to tackling.

Each design is illustrated with a clear photo of the quilt laid out flat and (apart from the simplest designs in the book) also a diagram showing the arrangement of the pieces and the block sizes. Cassandra has also included a little "make it yours" section for each project, with suggestions for ways you could vary the design through your fabric choices, sizing, etc. Not much information is given about how she's chosen to actually quilt each design, though - the instructions focus mostly on making the quilt top then quilting and binding is covered in the Masterclass section.

All the designs in the book are inspired by traditional designs - these are Cassandra's interpretations of them, not a how to guide for sewing 25 different traditional quilts. For example, the English Paper Piecing quilt features just 66 pieced hexagons arranged in decorative rows across the quilt.

I love this idea of incorporating a time consuming, traditional technique in a contemporary quilt. The look is very fresh and - of course- the quilts will be much quicker to make!

All in all this is a really wonderful book and one I highly recommend if you're thinking about making a quilt, or even just curling up on the sofa reading about quilts and daydreaming about the one you'll make one day.

A World of Quilts: Designing and Making Contemporary Quilts Inspired by Traditional Patterns by Cassandra Ellis is published by Jacqui Small. RRP £25. It's available from Amazon UK, the Book Depository and many other bookshops. 

It's also been republished in the US as World of Quilts - 25 Modern Projects: Reinterpreting Quilting Heritage from Around the Globe, a paperback published by C&T Publishing, available on Amazon USA.

Please note: I was sent a free review copy of this book. The Amazon & Book Depository links in this post are affiliate links.

Book Review: The Origami Home

Have you ever tried origami? I loved making origami flowers when I was a teen, and really enjoyed the origami making workshop I attended at the Handmade Fair a couple of years ago so I was delighted when the lovely folks at Jacqui Small sent me a copy of The Origami Home to review.

Jacqui Small publish really beautiful creative books - like Sewing Made Simple, Quilt Love and Made by Yourself. Whenever you see one of their books you just know it's gonna be a lovely object... and The Origami Home is no exception!

It's a gorgeously chunky hardback featuring 30+ miniature pieces of furniture to make from paper.

The book also includes 55 sheets of specially printed papers in fabric and wallpaper designs from the likes of Little Greene and Mini Moderns so you can perfectly recreate the projects in the book.

 

The origami patterns are organised by room, so you can make little room sets to display on a bookshelf (so cute!).

 

There's an introductory section that covers the folding process and the symbols you'll encounter throughout the book.

 

Each chapter begins with a photo of the finished room set, then one by one it takes you through the steps you need to make each piece of furniture. There's a living room, modern-retro dining room, workspace, bathroom, terrace and more.

The step by step diagrams are illustrated with the same patterns as the paper used to make the piece. Although it's helpful to clearly see which is the decorated and which the plain side of the paper when folding, I have to admit that I found the addition of the pattern on top of the fold lines, arrows, etc. shown on the diagram rather distracting.

I'd definitely recommend starting with some of the designs that have been made from plain paper - and thus have less visually cluttered illustrations - so you can really clearly see the instructions while you're getting to grips with the techniques.

The Origami Home would be a great addition to your bookshelf if you have a passion for all things interiors-related, or if you're just interested in origami and want to try making something different to the usual animals and flowers.

The inclusion of the paper pack also makes this an ideal book to give as a gift as you can get crafting straight away!

The Origami Home by Mark Bolitho (chair of the British Origami Society) is published by Jacqui Small. RRP £20. It's available from Amazon, the Book Depository and many other bookshops.

Please note: I was sent a free review copy of this book. The Amazon links in this post are affiliate links.

Book Review: Ladies of Letterpress

Today I'm reviewing a gooooooogeous book: Ladies of Letterpress.

Ladies of Letterpress "is an organisation that champions the reviving craft of letterpress, and seeks to showcase the work of women printers". This book is a collection of that work - from greetings cards to posters and from calendars to coasters.

This is a big book! Here's one of the pages next to a biro, to give you an idea of the scale.

The book is a cross between a stylish coffee table book and a poster book, as all the pages are perforated so you can (should you wish) tear out the pictures you like the best and put them up on your wall.

Over 80 different printshops are featured, with one main image then (overleaf) a selection of smaller images of their work. So, when you tear out a page all the info about the printer is on the back.

 

There are also short profiles of each printshop...

... and details of the paper, inks and press used for each piece:

The book also includes five interviews, with printers chatting about how they fell in love with printing, their favourite tools, business tips, etc.

There's a wide mix of different styles represented, and dozens of pages that I wanted to tear out and put up on my studio wall immediately.

My only niggle about this book is that the info about the main "poster" image is always printed in the gutter of the page (so it's quite hard to read) and on the "wrong" side of the perforations (so if you tear out a page then the information about that design is left behind). Honestly though this doesn't get in the way of my enjoyment of this book as I'm not a printer myself or a student needing to know that info... I just want to ooh over all the lovely designs!

This is a beautiful book whose contents would look equally great on your coffee table or your walls, and it would be a great buy if you're looking to decorate a space on a budget.

Ladies of Letterpress is published by Ivy Press. RRP £24.99. It's available from Amazon UK, Amazon USA, The Book Depository and many other bookshops.

Please note: I was sent a free review copy of this book. The Amazon & Book Depository links in this post are affiliate links.

Book Review: Crafty Dolls

Last year I reviewed a very cute, family-friendly craft book called Crafty Creatures... and today I'm reviewing the follow-up: Crafty Dolls.

Crafty Creatures was completely adorable and this second book is just as cute. As before, the book includes projects to knit and to sew, which are all achievable projects for kids or other beginners and which all include lots of possibilities to personalise the designs and to be creative.

How could you resist a book with a title page as cute as this one?
 

 

I love the little doll the author, Jane Bull, has knitted of herself and how both Janes welcome you to the book!

Crafty Dolls is divided into four sections: rag dolls, "woolly" dolls, "dolly mixtures" and a techniques and tips section with clear step-by step photos. The templates are all provided at full size and are dotted throughout the book.

The rag dolls build on the same basic patterns, with variations and accessories so you can mix and match bodies, hair, faces, clothes and accessories to create personalised dolls or dolls with a whole wardrobe of outfits to choose from.

You can also make ballerina or fairy folls, topsy-turvy dolls and a mermaid with wonderful yarn hair.

In the "woolly" dolls section there are dolls to knit and dolls to make from gloves and yarn scraps. There are step by step photos for the knitting patterns as well as the sewing patterns and, again, there are lots of suggestions for ways to personalise your dolls and create lots of different dolls from the same patterns.

I love these simple dolls knitted from simple squares:

Finally, the "dolly mixtures" section includes doll-shaped lavender bags, small pillows with characters drawn on and one of the cutest things I have ever seen: mini dolls for the rag dolls to play with... which come with even more teeny dolls of their own! All with matching outfits!

SO MUCH CUTENESS.

Cute, charming and with lots of clear instructions and simple, kid-friendly projects this is a fab little book. It would be a great book to buy if you've got young relatives to make gifts for (who wouldn't want a doll version of themself for their birthday?) or if your kids are learning to knit and/or to sew things for themselves.

Crafty Dolls is published by Dorling Kindersley Ltd. RRP £12.99. It's available from Amazon UK, Amazon USA, The Book Depository and many other bookshops.

Please note: I was sent a free review copy of this book. The Amazon & Book Depository links in this post are affiliate links.