ellajohnston12

Posted on September 29, 2015September 30, 2015 by ellajohnston12

How to make a book in eight easy steps

If you are anything like me you’ll have loads of spare bits of patterned, or even plain, card and reams of paper lying around. I’ve got a great little Japanese stab-bound book project that uses up all your stash and is brilliant for when you want to make handmade gifts for people.

So here’s how to make a book in eight easy steps. I’ve screenprinted one of my bird illustrations onto a card cover of my book but you can make yours with anything you like.

YOU WILL NEED
Awl
Ruler
Pencil
Two sheets of A6 card for your cover
15 sheets of 120gsm A6 paper
Book-binding thread and needle
Rough paper (same size as your book pages and card)

1: Use rough paper to make a template. With a ruler, draw a line from top to bottom of the rough at 1cm from the spine. Starting 1cm from the top, mark off an even number of points spaced evenly on that line.

2: Working on a hard, flat surface. Use the awl to make holes in the intersections as shown – I’m protecting my table (and my hands) by placing the paper on a cork board so the awl can ‘sink in’.

3: Place the front cover card underneath the template, holding or clipping the front edge to keep from moving. Protect your work surface as you punch a hole at each of the marked points using an awl. Repeat for the back cover.

(c) Ella's Place 4: Place a quarter of the book pages underneath the template and make holes as shown. Continue with the remaining pages doing quarters at a time. The pages and cover should all look the same once punched.

5: Put all the pages, including the front and back covers, together. Thread the needle through the top back hole of the book, leaving some thread loose. Make a running stitch along the holes in the book, pulling the thread tight each time through a hole while keeping your top thread loose.

6: Loop the thread at the bottom of the book’s spine and go through the bottom hole. Place the book on its side, loop around the top of the spine and go through the bottom hole again.

7: Do a running stitch into the next hole, loop around the top of the spine and go through that hole again on to the next hole. Repeat until you get to the top of the book.

8: Make a loop at the top of the book and go through the top hole. Slip the needle under two of the top bindings coming out of starting hole. Tie a tight knot with the original loose thread.

Look – you’ve made a book!

Posted on September 24, 2015September 21, 2015 by ellajohnston12

What to do with spare fabric

I’ve been designing fabric patterns and have ordered lots of my handprinted leaf design in blue from my Spoonflower shop to craft with. So, after making cushions, lampshades and using it to revamp some little steps I have (more about that later), I’ve got an excess of little bits and pieces.

So what to do? Well I’ve got a lovely set of wooden boxes from BoxyLady.co.uk and I’ve used my blue and white material to cover these little numbers with. They are really easy to do – simply measure your fabric to fit the box, brush the boxes with PVA and place the fabric so it bonds with the glue, mitring the folds and snipping away any spare bits of fabric as you go.

Here’s the result. These containers are great for those little fiddly household items. I use this box to keep my tea-lights in when I’m not using them and it sits pride of place on my sideboard in the dining room.

Posted on September 21, 2015September 21, 2015 by ellajohnston12

Meet Ella’s menagerie

When we moved into our new house it was our mission to create a little menagerie of cool animals and characters – admittedly they are almost all ceramic, fabric or wood, but Dr B and I love them nonetheless and have invented back stories for all of them.

We have a collection of characters ‘protecting’ every room; here is a selection of our favourites…

Ferdinand and Isabella
We met this couple of bulls at Judy’s Vintage Fair in Bethnal Green. We got them for a song (I think a fiver for the pair). The mother and son duo are from Pamplona in Spain, Isabella is a bohemian pacifist and really didn’t want her boy getting into bull fighting so she came to East London after hearing that was where the art was at. However when Isabella heard about Wivenhoe’s amazing artistic heritage and community she was convinced this pretty estuary town was the perfect place to bring up her son – especially when she read about Wiv’s connection with Richard Chopping, Dennis Wirth-Miller and Francis Bacon in this article here.

Henry and Matilda
This Anglo-French couple were first introduced to us at Divine Intervintage. Theirs is a beautiful story of love beyond the boundaries of class. Henry is a good East End boy, poor but honest with a musical hall past. Matilda, on the other hand, went to the finest Parisian finishing schools and dined with the créme de la créme of French society. According to Matilda the duo met when some cad had left her stranded outside the Royal Opera House in the rain. Henry was passing by and charmed her with his ready wit and impeccable manners – he has certainly charmed us!

Cedric the Sparrow
Standing proud and resplendent in maple, Cedric may be a beautiful wooden turned Sparrow by designer Lars Beller Fjetland but what isn’t so well known is that Cedric’s also a leading academic. He has given lectures all around the world and is an expert in Egyptology – in fact he was working in the Cairo Museum of Antiquities when it all started kicking off in Tahrir Square. He prefers doing his research in the modernist masterpiece that is the Essex University Albert Sloman Library.

Thoreau
Cedric is very close to our resident poet Thoreau, an Alexander Girard handmade doll. He’s had a fairly colourful life, spending time in Havana, San Francisco, Ibiza and a period with Andy Warhol at the Factory. However he is notoriously discreet so he’s rubbish for getting gossip out of. But BRILLIANT for screenprinting and film-making tips!

Ian
This cloth cat has been friends with us for a long time. We met him at Family Tree in Exmouth Market. Ian’s life has been, well, eventful, and while he is mostly sober, sometimes we have been known to find him in a smoke-filled haze listening to Black Sabbath or hard-core nineties rave very loudly on his headphones with a thousand-yard stare on the go – we don’t judge him. We love him.

Mark
Luckily Ian has Mark. Mark is a Christian and, while DrB and I are not ‘believers’ we respect this wooden owl’s views. He has a qualification in counselling and is very understanding of Ian’s erratic behaviour having worked in various hostels around the country.

Posted on September 11, 2015September 4, 2015 by ellajohnston12

5 Scandi-Style Homewares

Scandinavian inspired design never seems to go out of fashion. I think it’s the fact that this style lends itself to contemporary, grown up and super cool looks while it can also be stylishly whimsical too. My stamped pattern designs have been influenced by the former using simple shapes and a cool colour palette. Here’s five of my favourite homeware buys that reflect this look.

1: Dala Horse in natural concrete, at Cranmore Home: cranmorehome.com.au
2: ‘Green Curve II’ Screenprint by Emma Lawrenson at Etsy: etsy.com
3: Samaki cushion coverat Andshine: andshine.co.uk
4: Jangneus Green Herbs dishcloth, at Berry Red: berryred.co.uk
5: IM015 Swiss Linen in yellow and grey at Milton and King: shop.miltonandking.com

Posted on September 7, 2015September 4, 2015 by ellajohnston12

How to organise your craft materials – Part 1

I’m not a woman who spends loads of money on handbags and shoes. I’m not even that much of a voracious clothes buyer. No, I spend pretty much all my disposable income on art and craft materials. Here’s how I organise mine.

As I have so much equipment, I need to organise it in two ways. One, as general put it away and keep things neat and tidy when I’m not using it (more of that later). Two, the things for ‘live work’ – stuff I need as I’m working.

As I mentioned before, I have an abundance of black Faber Castell India ink PITT artist pens in various nib sizes, plus a load of drawing pencils and probably more scalpels than a woman needs. All of which as an illustrator I need to hand – and all of which I have a habit of mislaying if I don’t have a home for them!

As I’m currently working on my stamped designs as well as my ongoing drawing practice, I have a lot of little fiddly items that I really can’t misplace. There are messy ink pads (in specific colours), scalpel blades and my collection of hand-carved stamps (true one-offs that I really, really don’t want to lose).

These tricky-to-store bits and pieces need a home, and in true crafty fashion I’ve done a bit of upcycling and personalising when it comes to go-to craft room storage.

All the pens and brushes I’ve got on the go, plus my bookbinding tools, are all stored easily to hand in little tins covered with my red heart fabric. Tins make for great storage – they hold so much, I can see what’s in them and access them easily, plus you can line them up in row to look uniform.

My little inky items live in an old chocolate treats tin that is also covered in my red and white fabric. I love using these round containers: you can stack them up for easy organising and you can pop a lid on them to keep everything concealed. I have lots of these in my craft room, either painted or covered in paper and fabric (I’ve been known to colour code these for stamps, floristry stuff, threads and fabric scraps etc).

It’s easy to cover both types of tin too. I love a bit of decoupage. You simply use a tape measure to work out the circumference and the height, then cut your fabric to these dimensions (I’ve used pinking sheers for this). Then simply cover the tin with strong PVA glue and wrap around to cover the side. For the lidded tin I’ve cut out sections of fabric and layered these over the lid. I’ve then covered all the containers with PVA to seal the fabric and act as a varnish.

Posted on August 31, 2015August 30, 2015 by ellajohnston12

Eight Rainy Day Homewares

It’s an August Bank Holiday Monday in Britain – and tradition has it that it’s normally a bit grey and rainy!

As someone with Celtic heritage who is married to a Cumbrian, I actually quite like a drizzly day. I’d have to: family holidays in Ireland, annual visits to the Lake District and much-loved trips to my favourite cities of Glasgow and Edinburgh are often rain-filled affairs. Also, although our part of Essex is generally quite dry, the big, Constablesque skies we have mean that when the weather isn’t so sunny you are often treated to panoramic views of stunning slate grey.

So, let’s celebrate the rain and embrace those cosy grey days with my pick of shower-themed homewares…

1: If Storms Should Come… Print, £35 at Iapetus: iapetus.co.uk
2: Rainy Day Blanket by Donna Wilson, £195 at Rume: rume.co.uk
3: Cloud Felt Coaster Set, £14.50 for four at Etsy: etsy.com
4: Handmade Ceramic Soap Dish, £21.37 at Etsy: .etsy.com
5: Cloud Cushion $199 at Cumulus Living: cumulusliving.com.au
6: Mid Wedgwood No113 Paint, from £20 a litre, Myland Paints: mylands.co.uk
7: Cloud Pencil & Eraser Set, £10 at Red Candy: www.redcandy.co.uk
8: Cloud Kids’ Rug, €135 at KSL Living: ksl-living.fr

Posted on August 30, 2015August 30, 2015 by ellajohnston12

How to show you care… write a letter, send a card

I love letter writing and I like sending friends and colleagues little notes and cards.

Handwritten messages are a wonderful thing. It’s a real delight to receive a handwritten letter or card, so much better than a text or an email. Plus you can keep a handwritten piece – I store my favourites in a little box and if they’re particularly lovely, I display them on my kitchen pin-board.

That’s why I like to make stationery that is really special – one you can send yourself or give as gifts to others. For this handprinted collection, I’ve drawn and carved out a leaf design on a rubber block then used rich pigment ink to colour it. I’ve then stamped the motifs over quality card and paper to create a stationery set that is unique every time. Just like a piece of handwriting.

I currently have two products using this technique – a stationery box set and a notecard box set.

The stationery set has ten leaves of A5 size handprinted writing paper, five A6 handprinted postcards, 15 handprinted envelopes and ten recycled handprinted paper gift tags.

The notecard box contains ten leaf postcards, five in orange, five in blue.

My leaf stationery sets are available to buy on Not On The High Street.

Posted on August 27, 2015August 27, 2015 by ellajohnston12

DIY: make your own lampshade

I’m embracing the DIY ethic this month and have just made a really easy lampshade with my own fabric. I have to say I’m very pleased with it – and you can easily make one too.

This summer I’ve been creating new designs using a rubber block print technique. I simply draw, then carve out a motif from a block, ink it up and start making lovely prints with it.

These block prints look great when translated into fabric design so, after ordering a few designs from my Spoonflower shop, I used my red heart fabric to make a lampshade.

To make the shade I used a 20cm Oval Lampshade Making Kit from Needcraft. I’ve worked with the round lampshade kits before and found them really straightforward to make with, so I branched out this time with a slightly more unusual shape. The kits contain two lampshade rings (one with the fitting), one self-adhesive lampshade panel (to adhere your cover onto), self-adhesive tape and a rolled edge tool for finishing – all you need to do is add fabric to cover. It’s as easy as that. As with the other kits the picture instructions and step-by-steps were easy to follow so the shade was made in around 15 minutes.

I didn’t want a pendant shade and, because I wanted my creation to have maximum impact, I chose a small base so my hearts take centre stage. Of course your choice of base is down to you. If you have a lamp base that could do with an upgraded shade, I’d really recommend it.

Posted on August 25, 2015May 26, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Darling Dahlia

I couldn’t resist sharing this pic with you. These gorgeous dahlias, so prevalent in the month of August, were actually grown in our garden. There are so many blooms coming from it, we’ve had to cut some for the house in order to let the little blossoms thrive.

Forgive me proper gardeners, I’m still quite new to this. In fact this is our first year of growing dahlias so I’m really pleased with this, having learnt that planting flowers for the garden is all about celebrating the little successes. I’m hoping this wonderful abundance of velvety flower heads isn’t a fluke and we have the same again (or even more) next year.

Posted on August 23, 2015August 25, 2015 by ellajohnston12

Pleasant way to spend a Sunday

Despite the rain this afternoon I’ve had a very pleasant Sunday. Amazingly it was spent generally tidying up the house and, particularly, the garden.

Over the past month or so we’ve been enjoying the flowers that late summer has brought us as they mingle among the wildness of dried allium blooms and silvering poppy heads. The latter were starting to look scruffy though, rather than romantic, so today I did a bit of dead-heading and cutting down, which gave me a whole new set of things to display in the house. I like showing off dried flowers as a great, cost-effective way of adding notes of interest to a space; they look very effective as floral arrangements and are a nice way of gently preparing yourself for autumn.

So, that done, I’m also treating me and the good Dr to one of his favourite dishes, a roast tomato and pepper broth with potato, butter beans and greens. It’s warming – perfect for a rainy day like today – but the tomatoes and peppers give it a sweet taste of late summer. Find the recipe here.