Altered Book Tutorial - Preparing Your Book for Altering 

Why thank you, Jessica. It truly makes me happy to hear from folks out there making and learning stuff, touching base and comparing notes. Hope you have a creative weekend! 🌷🌼🌻Kelly

Ha. And you haven't even seem my stack of 19th century Welsh bibles. The truth is that we have not had a flea market in over a year and the second hand bookstores have only been open for a few weeks last year and I am very very short on new old books. I know how it is about time! You can always add this video to "watch later". I keep a stash of videos to watch, anytime I am tempted to watch the news. Arts, crafts, and adorable kittens. 😸

Dear Cheryl, Funny about all of your message. When I first started preaching the gospel of the altered book, I assumed that I would be asked about manifesting vision, the mysteries of how art reveals itself, and so on but nope. By FAR the question I get the most is: How do you get your pages so darn flat? (Serves me right.😎) Re accent - I am from Mississippi and around age 17 trained myself out of my accent. Now I am sorry I did but I was 17 and prejudiced. Later I spent ten years in Boston and my son was born in Cambridge, Mass, so there. And you? Kelly

@@BookandPaperArts I did hear you mention Mississippi when you spoke about your yellow and black scissors…(apparently you have multiple pair), one lives at your son’s, and a pair in your “flat”. Which is so much nicer to hear than the word apartment. I grew up on Cape Cod (paradise) and now live in Virginia. Spent a few years in Boston, (definitely not a city girl), although Boston never felt like a big city to me. I am not a world traveler, but have been to London- sadly during the awful Grenfeld apartment (see, there’s that word) fire. That was devastating. Also love Toronto. I love vintage things, and books are just a part of that….my partner and I have talked about (daydream is an apt word) moving to Europe….maybe one day….🤍🤍🤍

@@BookandPaperArtsI also trained myself out of my southern accent as a teenager. We moved from my hometown of Columbia, SC at 14 to Oregon which is the tv/news anchor neutral for American accents. I got a lot of attention due to the accent. Not necessarily bad attention. People thought it was cute, but I was shy and didn’t want any attention. We had a section on accents in drama class and I used that to unlearn. Plus Australian mother, dad from Chicago and spent summers with cousins on Long Island, so people can never place my accent now. 😂 Thank you for such informative videos! Beautiful work on your finished projects. 💖🤗

@@AndreaCrisp Hi Andrea. Makes you wonder how many of us are out there. I wish I had my southern accent now that I live in a place where it is considered charming but how was I supposed to know that when I was 17 and angry? (Hmmm, pretty much apply that to everything and repeat.😺) Thanks for touching base and comparing notes! Kelly

Hi Kathy. If it helps, I make altered books for a living as well as for love and have been making them for over 17 years and at least ONE out of three breaks apart or otherwise ends in disaster. It hurts. Often, however, I am able to take those pages out of the broken book and put them in another art journal so the work isn't all lost. I also sometimes use the broken books for making crazy art experiments in so that eventually I have a fun, distressed, messy book of stuff I learned from and that helps, too. Keep me posted and don't give up on making those altered books! Kelly

Wow Lani, thank you for that feedback! Really, because I am been a little worried that I don't meander enough like other (very nice) videos that do seem to get off the beaten track. I prefer to get to the point then get off so we can all make new stuff and be inspired but with less screen-time. So thank you for confirming that hunch.

Thank you for your helpful feedback, dear Alicia. 🌞

Why thank you. This is truly nice to hear. I hope you are going to make gorgeous pages. Keep me posted! Kelly

Thank you so, Josie. Book altering is a little pond but I am delighted to be swimming in. And yes, the best way to learn is by making several books and being willing to learn from what works and what doesn't. Alter on! Kelly

Hi there. That is GREAT advice on pulling out the signature. I admit those threads can be a pain. I always admire people who have perfectly symmetrical signatures but I haven't got anything like the patience and somehow I manage to get it wrong all the same. Now I just skip that part and hope for the best. 🌞😁😸

I tear mine like you, it definitely saves the threads.

Lynn, interesting fact - in prisons, bibles are likely to be stolen as their super thin onion skin papers are valued for rolling contraband cigarettes. But somehow I doubt you will have much call for that with your hymnal. But that thin paper might make a good addition to collage, no? I cannot tell you how many books I made "wrong" before I got the hang of it. And I was going to add the mending to this video but I like to keep them short and punch. Look for the mending one in the next couple of weeks, sweetie.

Hi Kiki. Boy are you right about the trial and error. I do this for a living and one out of say, three books comes apart on me for reasons unknown. Gremlins? I like a variety of pockets, some self-pages and some from cards or whatnot. Keep me posted on how it is going!

Thank you so much, Regina. 🌼🌻🌷🌞

Thanks bunches, Gabriel.

Robyn, it is crazy. After all this time and yes, a ton of experience, a book can still make a fool of you half-way through altering. All I can do is give advice on how to make this less likely. It is an imperfect science.

You are so very welcome. Thank you for stopping by!🌷🌻🌼

Thank you for checking in, Catherine! This is one talky video, something I try to avoid but - it is the only way to explain it. 🌞

Mary, it is my real pleasure. So glad you touched base! Kelly🌷🌷🌻🌻🌼🌼

Hey Patti, glad you liked them!

It's my pleasure. 🌞😸😁

It is my real pleasure, Emily. Thanks for stopping by! Kelly

Thank you, Vanessa. I hope you make gorgeous pages! Kelly

Why thank you, Natalie. Have a creative weekend. 😁😸🌞

Hi Margaret. I would love to know more. I definitely have to improvise when it comes to the hollow/curved spine thing.

@@BookandPaperArts look up Nik the Booksmith. I purchased her class on how to make your own hollow back book binding. I use old book covers and make my spine which lays completely flat! I have an amazing second hand book store where every book is $1. !!!

Hi there, Nola. I do indeed. Sometimes I use them as canvases for collage work that I then hang. Sometimes I fill them with blank pages and use them as imperfect journals. But as I said, I also go ahead and practice new art techniques in them so I can see how it will look on the page, and that is kind of fun, too. 🌞🌼🌻🌷

@@BookandPaperArts Do you ever add a new spine and salvage the covers? I'd love to see how that is done. I've been researching how to do that, but find very little on how that's done. I have a number of them that I'd love to use not only as canvases, so I need to figure it out, ha! Anything you can share on how to do that would be wonderful. I'm going to start playing around to figure it out. My books are family books so I do want to use them for some journals. Love your videos and newsletters and always learn so much. Thank you!

PS yes I am pulling pages from the center of each signature.

@@TheSuedobbs Ha, that was my first question. You can always leave some of the torn bits in the centre and embrace it as texture. Or cover with gluing the pages as you say. If you want you can send me a photo but at the end of the day it is so much trial and error and learning from that. kelly@bookandpaperarts.com

Hi Sandra, the link is in the text below the video but if you don't see it, you can find it here at my website. If you are looking on a PC the sign-in fields are on the right; on a mobile phone, scroll allllll the way to the bottom and you will see the subscriber fields there. Or let me know and I will be happy to add your email address by hand. bookandpaperarts.com/

Hi there, Cynthia. So glad you asked: I have a whole video about making perfect, flat pages and here is the link. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-15P6kw-Cs_0.html The short answer, though, is that I use an acrylic gel medium. It is more thick than craft glue which leads to less buckling, although craft glue is also a possibility. I buy whichever one is on sale, usually Golden or Daler Rowney. The flatness comes from putting some kind of craft or greaseproof paper (I use baking parchment) between newly glued sheets in a section then weighing the sucker down and leaving it for a few hours or overnight. It works but it is one of the reasons that (for me) an altered book takes sooooooo long to prepare. I try to have two in the pipeline so I can work on one while pages are drying on the other. Let me know if this answers the question! Kelly

Jyst found your channel..I'm a Kelly to