Come celebrate summer at our next Northwoods Book Arts Guild meeting on Thursday, July 30, 2015, 4:45-7:00pm at The Folk School Fairbanks. Laurel Herbeck will lead the program with a great project using leaves to embellish papers for bookmaking. We will be applying water-based inks and paints to plants and hand-pressing them onto a variety of papers. We’ll make a small accordion book of our sample prints.

The history of plant printing goes back to the prehistoric cave. Plant prints were used on tapa cloth, in Leonardo’s notebooks, in old herbals for plant identification, by Benjamin Franklin to foil counterfeiters, and on scientific expeditions. The height of popularity of plant printing was during the 18th and 19th centuries when methods were developed to make multiple commercial copies and books.

Please bring a sketchbook or journal to practice in, apron, rubber or latex gloves, cutting mat, bone folder, watercolor or other soft brushes, and freshly cut leaves, flowers and grasses.

The Book Exchange theme is “Scavenged,” and it will be fascinating to see the treasures our members have created from found objects! Visit with your bookmaking friends, learn about progress on getting our Letterpress shipped to the studio, and shop for supplies at Paper Birches!