Hand stitching a fabric art journal together.

Last year I wanted to make a larger fabric art journal. I knew it wouldn't fit under my sewing machine arm when I was going to put it together so it had to be hand stitched together. I thought that it would take a long time to stitch but it didn't because a simple running stitch or ladder stitch was all it needed to hold strongly together.

I have made a video that you can watch here or view a larger size on YouTube by clicking the YouTube name at the bottom of the video screen.

1. The steps are basically the same as the machine stitched art journal. I made all the pages I wanted to include, then I began by hand stitching with running stitch the joining strips between two pages.

 2. I used ladder stitch to join each pair of pages to the next one making sure the outside edges were even.

3. You should end up with a stack of pages and a flap of fabric at each side of the spine to join the front and back covers to.

4. Attach the front cover and inside cover page to the flap. Your book should now be held together well and it is time for the finishing touches.

5. The final elements are to cover the spine and attach binding around the edges if you want. I did machine stitch the binding on because I was able to put the edge under my machine arm but you could hand stitch it on if you want.

I will share some close ups of the pages later this week when I have a chance to photograph them. Some pages have already been shared on the blog previously:
journal pages as inspiration for textiles
fabric art journal