. . . this Lustr'ed cloth . . .

A friend has suggested that since I am such an addict to books and magazines I should write about them on the blog. So here is my first offering.

I really like the cover of this book. Coppery colours appeal to me and the illustrated piece looks interesting and tactile. Unfortunately the interior layout does not reflect the same quality. First, there is the very twee and irritating use of three or four word quotations from Shakespeare as headings for sections. Second is the layout itself. There is very little white space, which makes the book hard to read. While there are copious photographs they are not always well-captioned. Some have no captions at all. I always skim a book looking at the pictures and the captions as my first reading and I found it to be very difficult with this publication.

These gripes aside, the content is impressive. While parts are repetitive, there are exhaustive and very clear directions on materials, colouring techniques, patterning and texturing, embellishments such as beads and braiding, combining metals with textiles and stitching by hand and machine. There are four projects which look very interesting (I am not a fan of project type books, but I am tempted to try a couple of these). At the end is a small gallery of works by the author and three other artists.

My opinion? I have played with combining metal and stitch before, but I am now inspired to do more. And isn't this the desired result?